#SAElections24: Who Will You Be Voting For?
On the 26th of May 2024, current president of South Africa and leader of the ruling party, Cyril Ramaphosa, delivered a national address reflecting on the past five years of the country’s sixth administration as a democratic republic, sharing the good and the bad. Tomorrow, the 29th of May 2024, marks the official commencement of SA’s general elections, in which millions of eligible citizens registered to vote will be going out in their numbers to exercise one of their most critical democratic rights.
According to statistics released by the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC), a total of over 27 million citizens have registered to put their Xs on the ballots come Wednesday, 12 million of these being male whilst the rest of the tally is accounted for by their female compatriots. The leading provinces when it comes to the number of registered voters are Gauteng (with 6.5 million registered voters), KwaZulu-Natal (with 5.7 million), and the Eastern Cape (with 3.4 million).
Surprisingly, the country’s most affected group – the youth – have among the lowest registered voter turnout with the age group 18-19 adding up to just over 550 000 registered voters while the 20-29 cohort amassed close to 4.4 million registered voters, which pale in comparison to older age groups such as the 30-39 and 40-49 groups. Among other things besides unemployment, the youth has been despondent, and much like older age groups, they, too are flustered by the illusion of choice, unsure whether to carry on with the ANC or to give other parties a chance.
The dilemma of knowing who to vote for can be simplified by taking each major party and picking their ideologies apart by using their position on the political spectrum. The following list and explanations have nothing to do with the leaders of the parties but what they stand for and how they present themselves on paper such as with manifestos.
Right-wing orientation is founded on conservatism, capitalism and pro-privatisation. This all means that parties found on this side of the political scope care much for the preservation of cultural and traditional structures in the form of values and institutions, which can be influenced by religion or culture, influencing other social inclinations such as their stance on LGBT+ affairs (being anti). Their free-market leaning also promotes the private sector and a free-market economy, which has its downside of being anti-poor, frowning upon social grants and the like.
Right Wing Parties Include:
1. The IFP (stronger dominance in the KZN and the fourth party in the 2019 general elections race)
2. The VF+
3. The ACDP
Centre parties are those that are positioned ambiguously at the centre, somewhat playing both ends against the middle. Centre-parties are rarely ever only centre, with some being centre-left and other centre-right. These parties, at the level of policies and ideologies, take into account the pros and cons of both leftist and rightist positions to extract the best parts of both while catering for (or trying to uphold) the interests of both worlds. Its ideology comprises of supporting an eclectic economy founded on liberalism and possessing individual freedom as well as democracy. Socially, centre parties support both government and private sector interventions.
Centre Parties Include:
1. The ANC (centre-right, the ruling party)
2. The DA (the second-best party in the 2019 race)
3. ActionSA (centre-right)
Other notable centre-oriented parties include the Mmusi Maimane-led BOSA as well as the newly-formed RISE Mzansi by Songezo Zibi.
Left wing parties are as anyone would expect the diametric opposite of their Right-wing counterparts. Their ideologies promote socialism and communism. Such parties are pro-poor and are anti-free-market, frowning upon the privatisation of things and they also believe in wealth equity in that their policies believe in wealth being evenly distributed rather than having poor people becoming poorer and rich people raking up more riches.
Left Wing Parties include:
1. The EFF (the third-best party in the 2019 race, also far left).
2. uMkhonto WeSizwe (newly-formed and led by ex-president Jacob Zuma).
3. COPE
However, all these parties listed above are the major and most popular parties as favoured by the public.
Who will you be voting for?