Quote of the week
Universal adult suffrage on a common voters roll is one of the foundational values of our entire constitutional order. The achievement of the franchise has historically been important both for the acquisition of the rights of full and effective citizenship by all South Africans regardless of race, and for the accomplishment of an all-embracing nationhood. The universality of the franchise is important not only for nationhood and democracy. The vote of each and every citizen is a badge of dignity and of personhood. Quite literally, it says that everybody counts. In a country of great disparities of wealth and power it declares that whoever we are, whether rich or poor, exalted or disgraced, we all belong to the same democratic South African nation; that our destinies are intertwined in a single interactive polity.
August and Another v Electoral Commission and Others (CCT8/99) [1999] ZACC 3
On patronage politics in the ANC
Nene’s firing sent the disturbing message that the rural barons were dominating the ANC. They have reportedly chosen the heads of the ANC women’s and youth leagues and its KwaZulu Natal leadership — now they could ignore a two-decades-old understanding in the ANC that the credibility of the finance ministry was more important than factional battles. But concern that the Treasury was in the hands of all-conquering patronage politicians united opponents on the left and right because it was clear that economic policy was not at issue, but whether the barons could get their hands on public resources.
