GAUTENG
COMMENT, by Pete Bower
MAGAZINE
HOW TO MAKE YOUR PLOT PROFITABLE
Vol 17 No 7
July 2016
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FRONT COVER
SA’s exhibit at the Chelsea Flower Show
featured the flora of the Kogelberg
Biosphere. It will be on show at
Garden World, Muldersdrift from
July 29 to Sep 4. See page 8
Your vote is VITAL
E
lections are important. Integral to the democratic process, they are
the one opportunity ordinary citizens have to shape the political
world around them. In South Africa we have two sets of elections,
one a proportional-representation exercise for national politics and one, constituency (or ward) based for local governance.
After 22 years of experience with the proportional-representation system many now
argue that it is flawed, useless and simply encourages mediocrity, unaccountability and
“snoutism” (the new word to describe the pigs-at-the-trough greed and profligacy
displayed by so many of our public representatives).
This argument certainly has merit. How much better would it be if we reverted to a
constituency system where individuals, preferably resident in their areas, would be
voted into office by their neighbours, to whom they would be accountable for their
pronouncements, decisions and actions.
Given the current focus on next month's local government elections that's an argument
for another day.
For many argue that if you want to be a true servant of the people you should become
a municipal councillor rather than a national member of parliament, because it is at
municipality level that real civic decisions are made, which affect the physical surroundings of citizens, and thus the value of their lives.
Think of it: the state of your verges, the smoothness of the roads in your suburb,
rubbish removal, provision of water and electricity, the cleanliness of your parks ~ all of
these facilities and services are provided by your local council and when things go
wrong it is to your local councillor that you should turn. That's certainly the case in our
ward. We have a very active, well-known and highly approachable councillor who
spends a considerable amount of his time sorting out power outages, having potholes
repaired and getting the council plumbers to attend to water leaks. This shouldn't be his
job, of course, but it is, because our council, like many others countrywide, is notoriously bad at answering its telephones and getting on with the job of repairing whatever
is broken.
We're lucky with our councillor. You may not be so fortunate in that your elected
representative may be an incompetent slacker. August 3, therefore, is your one
opportunity to improve your lot. Your vote could mean the difference between an
uncaring slacker and an energetic representative. That's why these elections are vitally
important, and your participation essential.
On election day you will receive a ballot paper which, as in previous years, will have a
myriad of voting choices, some being obscure political parties, others being of independent candidates. The fact remains that the contest in Gauteng this time around is
between the ANC, the DA and the EFF.
Opinion polls are suggesting that there is a very good chance that the ANC's domination of the Tshwane municipality may be over, with the possibility of a DA majority (and
as this edition went to press it was being clear through riots, arson and looting that
many voters were unhappy with the ANC’s choice of mayoral candidate). Certainly, the
DA should continue to hold the majority in the Midvaal municipality, which it already
runs, and equally certainly the ANC majority in most councils will be slashed, by
increases in the EFF representation to the left and by the DA to the oth