The ANC, as the winning party at the polls, has obtained the approval and mandate of only 28% of the voting age population
Over the course of the days following the election the media devoted extensive resources, airtime and space to covering and commenting on the historic process. The headlines referred mainly to the extent of the growth or decline of various parties, and the main debate was whether the ANC as the governing party would be able to retain its 60% support among voters.
This claim, and the silence of the media, raises more questions than it answers. Such as: should the media, as the sector of society tasked with raising critical questions be so unanimously silent on such a critical challenge facing our democracy? But what does this all mean for SA and our political future? Without rehashing the history of how states developed, it will suffice for our purpose to acknowledge that the state emerges as an inescapable institution within all modern societies.
But what about another scenario in which the regime continues to count as legitimate but certain of its laws are unjust? The injustice of those laws will mean that people are not under obligation to endorse and comply with them. Which leads us to another scenario in which the legitimacy of the state is called into question. When a state or regime is illegitimate the laws it upholds are individually illegitimate and the branches of government that run the state are illegitimate too.
Have we arrived at that point so soon after the end of one form of minority rule, only to be duped into supporting another form of minority rule? At play here is both the limited form of democracy that dilutes citizens’ participation in the democratic process to making a cross once every five years for a preferred ruler, as well as the denial of real and meaningful participation of citizens in their own governance.
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