Police must act to ensure peaceful elections, especially in KZN

As the country edges closer to the May 29 polls, there’s a foreboding sense of déjà vu — even if we hope it’s misplaced — about the possibility of resurgent political violence, especially in KwaZulu-Natal. As part of their duties, the police, assisted by the country’s intelligence services, do an assessment that ranks the risk of violence per polling station from low to medium or high.

KwaZulu-Natal police commissioner Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi this week informed political parties at an Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) event — at which they pledged to comply with the electoral code of conduct and all electoral laws — that there were polling stations at all three risk levels in the province.

He then announced that about 17,000 officers would be moved from their normal duties to man mostly high-risk voting stations to prevent the province’s descent into an orgy of violence.

“Political leaders, yes, we have high-risk areas because of you. The high-risk voting stations are as a result of people who don’t want to tolerate each other, people who violate each other’s rights as contained in the constitution,” said Mkhwanazi.

“That forces us to increase the number of police officers we deploy in that particular voting station to be able to prevent crime. Please give us space — we have a lot of criminals out there that are raping, stealing [from] and robbing people. We should be focusing on those and not policing those that have a right to go and vote, because the right is for everyone,” he added.

There is no gainsaying the province’s history of violent crime, including politically motivated assassinations. More lives were needlessly lost ahead of the historic allinclusive 1994 elections in KwaZulu-Natal than anywhere else.

Mkhwanazi was right to let the parties know their intolerance and violence comes with a R40m price tag — funds that could be used, for example, to help those affected by recurring floods in the province.

But it is the other costs not counted in rands that come with political violence that must worry us all. As a country, we surely can’t countenance a situation in which rapists and murderers are left unchecked — or barely policed — simply because police resources are used to quell potential political violence.

Why should we, in a country beset with so much violent crime, accept a situation where those who murder, rape or rob have improved chances of evading justice simply because those with an insatiable need for power can’t be trusted to compete fairly and without resorting to violence?

Such a state of affairs holds our country back.

We hope the mere existence of high-risk polling stations will not translate into actual loss of life in the days ahead. Politics doesn’t have to be pugilistic in nature. It’s only those whose arguments and ability to appeal to the general populace are poor who resort to violent means to gain power.

As our nation evolves, and new values and ideals about the multiplicity of voices in electoral processes are truly embedded in most poll participants, we hope those who embrace violence will be shunned by the electorate. No doubt, contestation for power will be fierce this year, what with 14,889 candidates from 70 political parties and 11 independent candidates vying for 887 seats in the National Assembly and the various provincial legislatures.

Mathematically, 14,002 of those who throw their hat into the ring will fail to win seats. It is clear that much of the noise intended to gnaw away at the IEC’s credibility is also meant, in a twisted way, to justify poor performance that becomes apparent after the polls. In other words, those who fear losing are preparing the ground for when they later project themselves as victims.

To be sure, the vast majority of the almost 28-million registered voters hope for peaceful participation in the polls. We hope the sense of déjà vu about electoral violence does not presage actual violence ahead of the polls.

Police top management in KwaZulu-Natal and elsewhere must do what is necessary to ensure peaceful elections. The opposite is anathema to our development as a country.