political parties - The African Mirror

Apr

2024

Mali political parties request elections after junta shuns transition promise

POLITICAL parties in Mali have requested a time frame for presidential elections after the ruling junta failed to organise polls within a promised 24-month transition back to democracy. Mali has been under military rule since August 2020, the first of eight coups in West and Central Africa over four years, including in its neighbours Burkina Faso and Niger. Regional blocs have been trying to negotiate transitions but the interim governments are dragging their feet. Mali's current junta seized power in a second 2021 coup and later promised to take 24 months from March 2022 to restore civilian rule, with a start date…

Oct

2023

By The African Mirror

Liberia elections 2023: three things the next president must do

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

LIBERIA, Africa’s oldest republic, is about to choose its next president. On 10 October, 46 political parties and 20 presidential candidates will compete for two million registered votes at 5,000 polling stations in 15 counties. But whoever wins will confront a polarised Liberia. CHARLES WRATTO, Associate Professor of Peace, Politics, and Conflict Studies, Babes Bolyai University Liberia is more divided than it has been since the end of its 14-year civil war in 2003. The war ended with the signing of a peace agreement, but its scars are still visible across the country. Frustration around the soaring cost of living,…

Jun

2023

By The African Mirror

South Africa has changed its electoral law, but a much more serious overhaul is needed

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

SOUTH African President Cyril Ramaphosa recently signed into law a change to the country’s electoral act to allow individuals to contest national and provincial elections independently of political parties. The change follows a June 2020 constitutional court judgment that the Electoral Act was unconstitutional because it didn’t allow independent candidates. Author MASHUPYE HERBERT MASERUMULE, Professor of Public Affairs, Tshwane University of Technology But in my view, the change corrects one wrong by creating another, especially concerning the principle of proportionality. For instance, it does not matter how many votes independent candidates get. Once they have reached the electoral threshold to…

Jul

2022

By The African Mirror

Sudan’s opposition guarded on army pledge to leave talks to civilians

NEWS

KHALID ABDELAZIZ SUDANESE political parties sidelined by a coup last October gave a guarded response to the army's pledge to step aside from a dialogue initiative and let civilian groups hold talks to form a government. The Forces for Freedom and Change (FFC) coalition said a speech on Monday by army leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan failed to spell out how the military would withdraw from politics, as demanded by the civilian opposition. Burhan's decisions "are a clear manoeuvre and tactical retreat that appear to accept the principle of the army returning to the barracks, while emptying this principle of any…

Sep

2021

By The African Mirror

Municipal elections: Relief for SA parties

NEWS

AFRICAN MIRROR REPORTER SOUTH African political parties who had missed the deadline to register candidates for the municipal elections have been given a lifeline by the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC). The IEC announced today that registration for candidates would be reopened and political parties will be able to register their candidates on September 19 and 20. The announcement would come as a great relief to the ANC, the dominant party in most municipalities which had failed to register candidates in several municipalities. IEC commissioners have dismissed allegations that the re-opening of registration for candidates was designed to favour the ANC.…

Nov

2020

By The African Mirror

Why South Africans need to give political parties more money

THOUGHT LEADERSHIP

STEVEN FRIEDMAN, Professor of Political Studies, University of Johannesburg IF South Africans fear that funding political parties is a waste of money, they may care to think about the costs of not funding them. But, if they want value for their cash, the way parties get money needs to change. Party funding is back on the agenda in South Africa after the treasurer of the governing African National Congress (ANC), Paul Mashatile, said taxpayers needed to give parties more money. Finance minister Tito Mboweni says he is willing to listen to the argument. Almost inevitably, parts of the media known…