Op-Ed: SA can learn from Karl Marx when it comes to electoral reforms By Paul Trewhela
Karl Marx, while living in London, played a crucial role in bringing the vote to the majority of British working class men through the Great Reform Act of 1867 – an issue worth considering ahead of the general election in May, after the ANC’s party list of candidates revealed a tranche of ministers tainted with corruption in the State Capture inquiry headed by Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo.
The fact is, South Africa’s electoral law in the Constitution of 1993 allows for no constituencies whatsoever for election to the National Assembly and provincial legislatures, and for only half of the municipal seats. MPs in South Africa represent party headquarters, not voters in “equal constituencies”, as the Charter demanded.
In parallel with his work in 1867 in preparing publication the same year of the first volume of his most major work,, Marx took an active part in the work of the Reform League alongside the English trade union leaders. This resulted in the demonstration and riots in Hyde Park in London in May 1866, which prompted Disraeli the following year to extend the franchise to “lodgers”, in this way including the majority of working-class males.
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