South Africa is going to the polls for the 3’rd fully free elections on Wednesday the 14’th April.
Thus far all opposition parties are trying to prevent the ANC government getting a 2/3’rd majority as it would allow them to change the constitution as they want.
The NNP (old Apartheid party of de Klerk) has formed a coalition with the ANC! How’s that for old enemies getting together.
Will update as things happen…
Re: South Africa's elections
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*Originally posted by The Old Man: *
Thus far all opposition parties are trying to prevent the ANC government getting a 2/3'rd majority as it would allow them to change the constitution as they want.
....
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What sort of changes would they be planning? Would these changes be for the benefit of the people or for the rulers?
Re: Re: South Africa's elections
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*Originally posted by Awam ki Awaz: *
What sort of changes would they be planning? Would these changes be for the benefit of the people or for the rulers?
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A lot of speculation is done about what would be changed. Some are:
Change for the present President Mbeki to remain in power more than 2 sessions
Change to enable the government to take land away in order to redistribute it
Any other small issues that in the past hampered the present government in their ideas. During the pre-election negotiations when the Constitution was drawn up, the ANC had to make concessions in certain areas in order to move ahead in negotiating. With a 2/3'rd majority they can rewrite the constitution as they see fit.
All of a sudden all party leaders become very religious just before the election. All 9 major parties visited the black ZCC Zionist Church’s rally during the Easter weekend. I add some highlights:
*The nine main political parties have signed a pledge in front of millions of Zion Christian Church members, committing themselves to a free and fair election.
The parties signed the pledge at Moria City in Polokwane yesterday under the auspices of the ZCC’s leader, Bishop Barnabas Lekganyane, grandson of the man who founded the church in 1910.
President Thabo Mbeki represented the ANC, although Minister of Defence Mosiuoa Lekota signed for the party.
It was not easy to gauge how many people attended the gathering, but ZCC organisers claimed that 4-million of the church’s 9-million members were spread across the giant area.
Easter is one of the ZCC’s three major annual celebrations, when millions of people flock to Moria.
The ceremony lasted for about four hours, even though there were only two speakers (Lekganyane and Mbeki), both of whom spoke briefly.
But Shilowa continually called on the ZCC dancers, known as the umkhukhu dancers, to perform between speeches and even paragraphs. Additionally, each sentence was translated from English into Sepedi, isiXhoza, isiZulu and Shangaan.
During this time, the church members - dressed in bright green, yellow and blue colours - sat quietly under the beating sun.* http://www.thestar.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=128&fArticleId=400625
BTW: These rallies can sometimes have up to 5 million people together (no children) over a weekend on a camping site where most sleep under the open sky. No-one has ever been hurt due to stampedes as far as I know. All members need to pay at least $10 to attend and have to provide their own food. I once met the bank manager in Pietersburg where the church bank and he told me that he normally close the bank for all other customers for at least two days to enable his people to count and process the money.
Today people go to the polls and will decide:
Whether the ruling ANC will get 2/3 of vote and can unilaterally change the constitution
The ANC for first time succeed to win all 9 provinces outright. They were always kept out of power in Kwazulu and had to go into a coalition with the old apartheid government party NNP to get control of the Western Cape
Will this be the swansong of the NNP due to dwindling support
Will the present opposition (DA) maintain there position
Will the ACDP (Christian Party) continue to grow as per previous elections and move up from the 6'th to the 4'th in size
How the small parties with popular personalities fare (ID, NA, Bad Brad, Peter Marais)
21 parties battle for national honours. How many will get persons in parlement this time round (presently 14)
Someone pinch me, i must be dreaming. A thread in WA that doesn't refer to the Middle East, the US, or Israel? Holy smokes, what is this world coming to.
Thank you for posting this thread, T.O.M. i think it is pretty much a foregone conclusion that the ANC will win. But will they get KwaZulu-Natal from the Inkatha Freedom Party?
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The NNP (old Apartheid party of de Klerk) has formed a coalition with the ANC! How's that for old enemies getting together.
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Sorry, dumb question, but what does the abbreviation NNP stand for?
When will the results be officially announced?
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*Originally posted by Nadia_H: *
I think it is pretty much a foregone conclusion that the ANC will win. But will they get KwaZulu-Natal from the Inkatha Freedom Party?
Sorry, dumb question, but what does the abbreviation NNP stand for?
When will the results be officially announced?
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The ANC will win without doubt. The margin is the only unknown. Last elections in '99 they received 1 seat less than the 2/3'rds they now want.
I don't think the IFP will hold on to KwaZulu-Natal. It will be interesting to see who as a coalition will rule the province.
NNP=New National Party. They felt the old baggage is too heavy and sort of changed the name - not much though. Interesting is that many old Ministers are now voting for the ANC: Pik Botha, Roelf Meyer, etc.
They are still voting as I type. Some voting stations will remain open a little longer than the official 21h00 due to long queues. First results will start coming in at ±6 hours time. The official result will be done on Friday, I think.
BTW. If ignorant and willing to learn, there is no dumb question!
Just thought I would spruce WA up a bit :) what with all the USA bashing going on.
All election results are updated continuously at this site.
The IFP’s voter base is the rural areas of Kwazulu-Natal and therefor will only start to come in about 15 hour’s time.
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*Originally posted by The Old Man: *
Just thought I would spruce WA up a bit :) what with all the USA bashing going on.
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:) I will stick your very informative and relevant thread near the top so that more people can take notice, and comment. Thanks for posting T.O.M.
Here is a map of the provinces of South Africa.
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Thanks for this link, T.O.M. http://www.elections.org.za/ Very useful. As of right now, apparently, the IFP has 38% of the votes in KwaZulu Natal, the ANC has 41%. i don’t know if that counts rural votes automatically or not; as you suggested, we may have to wait for the rural results to come in.
ANC has some 66% of the overall votes BBC NEWS | Africa | ANC heading for massive victory 80% turnout for an election is amazing - we don’t get that high a turnout in most western countries if i am not mistaken. Probably because most people in South Africa can still remember a time when they weren’t allowed to vote - hence, unlike us, they do not take their rights for granted.
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This picture reminds me of 1994 in a way.
I think you are correct. Funny enough all parties had a difficult time in convincing the young voters to use their democratic right. Maybe because they were too young <10 years old during first elections and do not have the same attitude towards voting as older people that lived during apartheid.
The place I went to vote is a small secluded poling station and I went through within 5 minutes.
I dearly would like to see comments from South Africa’s political expert (Cat-Lady) about her impressions. Suppose she is on holiday, again…
My daily newspaper had a front page picture with he caption “Who might this be?”](http://www.news24.com/Beeld/Home/).
Thanks Mursalim for the privilege!
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i love this picture. Something about how the light has captured his silhouette… i dunno. i saw it earlier on some other website.
i THINK Cat-woman is currently in Japan for her studies. i MIGHT be mistaken about this though.
BBC: “The ANC has some 70% of votes counted so far, with the opposition Democratic Alliance polling around 14%.”
If they do get that 2/3 majority, what parts of the Constitution do they plan on changing - which sectors of the country would it affect?
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*Originally posted by Nadia_H: *
BBC: "The ANC has some 70% of votes counted so far, with the opposition Democratic Alliance polling around 14%."
If they do get that 2/3 majority, what parts of the Constitution do they plan on changing - which sectors of the country would it affect?
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Don't rightly know - that's the scary part. The ANC has been pushing hard for this 2/3'rds majority and there must be a reason for.
Never thought i would see the day when an extremely rational-minded South African citizen would be scared of any aspect relating to the ANC. i know their top echelon of officials is now mostly made up of right-wing elitists, but have they really drifted that much away from the ‘ordinary’ South African ? Is their the perception that they are still in touch with the thoughts and beliefs of ordinary South Africans ?
hmmm 
Official results are in. They didn't get an overwhelming majority in KwaZulu Natal... does that mean they will have to form a coalition with smaller parties like the IFP?
Will have to wait and see. In the past the IFP and the ANC combined into a coalition. Indications presently is that some of the young leaders in the IFP don’t want to include the ANC in the coalition. Doubt if any of the two will be able to form a strong enough coalition with other parties (excluding each other) and be able to rule.
Never thought of myself as such…
I am not very optimistic of any politician. Power corrupts and with a 2/3’rds majority absolute power might have the effect that the ANC start to not think straight anymore.
Then perhaps you should start thinking of yourself in that way.
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i really hope not.