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South Africans should be grateful for their vibrant democracy and the freedoms they enjoy, says former Independent Electoral Commission head Pansy Tlakula.
Speaking to City Press as results from the elections were showing a sea change in South African politics, Tlakula was also full of praise for the IEC’s delivery of an “almost flawless” election.
Tlakula resigned from the IEC in 2014 after 12 years with the institution, having served it as both chief electoral officer and chairperson.
But she spoke with pride about the conduct of those participating in the elections.
As chair of the African Union’s African Commission on Human and People’s Rights, she said she observed serious violations of rights on the continent.
For instance, governments in some African countries find reasons to jail opposition leaders around who posed electoral threats to them.
“... We should be grateful that we have freedom of association and we have freedom of assembly, and there is tolerance for different political views. No single opposition leader was jailed.”
She said some countries went as far as jamming social-media sites such as Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp.
“They find reasons to do that in the name of national security. Some round up journalists who are critical of the political party, arrest them and shut down newspapers.
“Some axe everyone in their electoral agencies and replace them with new people. They also remove judges who are not pliable. None of these things happens in our country
The IEC, she said, “was an amazing organisation” with “extraordinary levels of efficiency” and which should be regarded as a “national pride”.
“It is a national pride, and we should all be proud to have it. Elections, especially local government ones, are a big thing and we should expect that some things will go wrong here and there, she said.”
“As you can see, the results are coming out quickly, which means there are few or inconsequential objections. It really is a world-class organisation.”
Tlakula said the IEC was held in such high esteem that other countries have asked it to help them with their elections. During her tenure she had hosted numerous international delegations that wanted to learn about the intricacies of running elections.
“At some point, I felt like we were a tourist organisation – we received delegations every week. We would spend days addressing delegations from all over the world.
“They wanted to know about the complexities of delivering free and fair elections, our relationship with political parties and how to maintain the institution’s independence,” she said.
While at face value, running an election might look like a simple task, Tlakula said it was a complicated exercise.
“You have serious issues of making sure the ballot papers are secure and that all the people employed by the IEC are independent.
“You will be surprised [to hear that] we fired many people after discovering that they were actually party candidates, or branch or regional officials belonging to this party or the other. The trick is to follow the law to the letter. If you do that, you will be out of the woods.”
Tlakula recalled the extraordinary challenges that the organisation had overcome during her tenure.
Tlakula said one of the hardest decisions she made during her 13-year stint at the commission was to disqualify the ANC from a by-election in Cape Town because the party submitted its documents late.
“I also disqualified the Inkatha Freedom Party for one reason or the other, and they went to court and they lost,” she said, adding that her “scariest moment” was when the agency ran out of ballot papers in one of the elections. An urgent rescue plan had to be made.
While these elections have been stained with blood after politically motivated murders, Tlakula said South Africa’s democracy remained vibrant.
“One life lost is one too many, and we need to address that,” she said. But, she added, “we have a lot of good things going on.
“There is even a peaceful transfer of power. That is how a democracy should unfold,” she said.
