In a first for democratic South Africa, there are now over 27 million registered voters on the voters’ roll, bucking the trend of lower voter registration and turnout that has plagued the country in recent years. In the 2021 municipal elections, voter turnout fell below 50%.
This was revealed on Wednesday when the Independent Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) briefed the country on its readiness to hold the second and final voter registration weekend.
IEC Chief Electoral Officer Sy Mamabolo highlighted the IEC’s online registration platform as a popular option between registration weekends.
Mamabolo revealed that just 4.1 million voters are between 20 and 29. The biggest age group on the voters’ roll is between 30 and 39, with 6.7 million registrations.
Young South Africans may feel underrepresented by the political parties on offer, according to Good Governance Africa. “Young voters might feel a lack of representation of their political or socio-economic views among the available political parties that also have a credible chance of success.”
Using the 2021 Zambia election turnout, which saw 54% of registered voters being young people and a 70.6% voter turnout as an example, the authors of the article offered solutions such as:
- Using social media to reach young voters. “These platforms can tailor campaigns to desired demographics, enabling effective youth-targeting by applying filters based on age and gender.”
- Engaging in political discussions with friends or family.
- Encouraging dialogue and providing platforms for citizens to voice their opinions can foster an informed and politically active electorate.
- Creating an environment that allows citizens to exercise their democratic rights without fear.
An independent grassroots organisation dedicated to getting South Africans to vote in 2024, Let’s Vote SA, agrees with using dialogue to get young people to register and vote. “Word of mouth and social media have proven to continuously be the most effective way to engage with and ultimately encourage eligible voters to register. We have seen people create TikToks and Instagram videos and posts encouraging the youth to participate in the upcoming election. These videos are reshared across platforms and ultimately reach those originally on the fence about registering to vote,” they said.
Let’s Vote SA says encouraging your friends, family, and colleagues to register does not require big marketing drives or a massive following. “A simple conversation, tweet, or video explaining the registration process and the importance of voting can do wonders to sway people towards registering.”
To combat misinformation around voting registration, the organisation has created short, fun and informative posts breaking down each element of the registration process to ensure that their followers are informed of what they need to do to vote on election day.”We were very purposive about the type of issues we wanted to tackle.
“We understood that to encourage people to vote, it was necessary to address voter information and voter apathy. We often hear people say that they do not know who to vote for or that there are no viable options available to them regarding the political parties who stand for the elections. To address this, we created our #InformedVoter2024 series, which profiled each political party likely to contest the upcoming elections,” they said.
Why this matters: Voting in South Africa is crucial for upholding democratic values, ensuring representation, addressing historical injustices, and shaping policies that promote social and economic development. It’s a hard-won right you can use to change the country.
Attribution: GovernmentZA, Flickr
