How mature is our young democracy?

Establishing the levels of maturity in any democracy isn’t as easy as just looking at the number of years a country has been practising it. This was quite evident during the 6 January insurrection in the US. Was it merely a blip; an “immature” response to political contests — a storming of the Capitol not to be repeated for another 200 years? Whatever the answer, what is certain is that democracy is delicate.

This week, South Africa held its sixth local government elections in what’s still a very young, 27-year democratic experiment. Question marks have been raised about the maturity of the project, given the very low participation rates. As a general rule, participatory rates in these polls aren’t great, but with only 28% of the qualified electorate taking time out go to vote this past Monday, the Mail & Guardian has fittingly deemed the polls “The Great Stayaway”.

The apathy is certainly a worry for such a young democracy. But it’s not a reflection of a society that is not politically engaged, judging by the number of service delivery protests that occur daily. Perhaps what it reflects is growing disillusionment with the body politic as a whole.

We’ve long spoken of a trust deficit between the state, business and the public. These polls clearly demonstrate that there’s a growing trust deficit between the leading political parties and, especially, young people — understandably, given their record high unemployment rates.

Their stayaway is a statement in itself: one can’t dismiss it as the immaturity of our democracy. The low turnout and its detrimental effects on our leading parties is something we hope they will take to heart as they look to rebuild their relationship with the electorate.

But the level of maturity required to do so has certainly been lacking, given the bewildering responses from some of our political parties to their disappointing results. Democratic Alliance leader John Steenhuisen hasn’t been alone in expressing his disquiet with the work of the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC), but he has also blamed the media for criticising both himself and the party in the run-up to the elections. Actionsa leader Herman Mashaba has also been highly critical of the chapter nine institution.

Democracy is delicate, and such utterances about the IEC and the media add yet another layer of discord. As we enter into a deepening era of coalition politics, we can only hope our body politic is able to show maturity in the “horse-trading” that comes with it. The focus must be on improving the lives of all South Africans to strengthen the foundations of what is still a capricious experiment with democracy.

If it’s about point-scoring and focusing on party elective conferences and national polls in three years’ time, we can expect only stagnation. Making coalitions work will take maturity: this means our body politic has some growing up to do.