John Kane-Berman
24 July 2008
column
Johannesburg — IT IS a pity that Ebrahim Rasool does not intend to challenge his removal from the premiership of Western Cape in court.
Irrespective of how good or bad a premier he has been, there is a vital constitutional principle at stake: to whom are members of the executive branches of government really accountable? And beyond that is another question: to whom are members of the legislative branches accountable?
In terms of the constitution, provincial premiers and their executive councils are accountable to the provincial legislature, which can remove them by a vote of no confidence. The African National Congress (ANC) has the power to engineer such a vote. If Rasool refused to go quietly, the ANC is entitled to expel him from the party and, ipso facto, the provincial legislature. So in the end Rasool may be history. But perhaps he could make history by a court challenge that would expose the democratic deficit that characterises the constitution.
There are three major problems. One is that the constitution permits the principle of executive accountability to an elected legislature to be trumped on the orders of party headquarters. The second is that provincial premiers have been turned into mere deployees of the ruling party. These two problems are themselves a function of a third, our list-based proportional representation (PR) electoral system, in which constituencies in the proper sense of the word do not exist. The problems occur at both national and provincial level.
IT HAS become a cliche that the South African constitution is one of the most democratic in the world. But it does not deserve this accolade. Democracy in SA happens for a day or two once every five years, then hibernates until the next election. In a democracy truly worth that name, voters would be able to choose their representatives. South African voters choose only lists, not individuals. Some parties then assign people from these lists to geographical areas as "their" member of Parliament (MP) or member of the provincial legislature (MPL).
However, probably the overwhelming majority of voters have not the foggiest notion as to who their assigned "representatives" are. And no wonder. Their MP or MPL is not their chosen representative but a deployee of one or another party, vulnerable to removal at any time. He has no incentive to serve the interests of his supposed constituents, merely those of his party bosses. One consequence has been the failure of ruling party MPs to challenge the government on its AIDS policy even when their purported constituents were dying all around them.
The PR system has the advantage of ensuring that minority parties are fairly represented in Parliament and at provincial level. Its disadvantages are evident. Fortunately, it is possible to marry a PR system with constituencies, as a committee under a former leader of the opposition, Frederik Van Zyl Slabbert, suggested years ago in a report that the government shelved.
Whether on the lines Slabbert proposed or otherwise, proper constituencies need to be introduced so that Parliament and the nine provincial legislatures become representative of voters rather than of parties. MPs and MPLs should all know that their chances of being re-elected next time round will depend not merely on keeping in their party's good books but on how well they serve the interests of their constituents.
This will give content to democracy between elections. It will breathe life into Parliament and provincial legislatures. It will increase the power of voters. It will also help give effect to one of the founding principles of the constitution, namely that SA should have "representative government". The constitution says the National Assembly is "elected to represent the people and to ensure government by the people". But the links between voters and the national and provincial legislatures are so remote as to prompt doubts as to whether we really have a system of representative government.
Kane-Berman is CE of the South African Institute of Race Relations.
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