Ann Eveleth
The African National Congress in KwaZulu-Natal is bringing a Constitutional Court action aimed at settling the question at the heart of the region’s political conflict: how much power should traditional leaders hold?
The ANC is challenging the Inkatha Freedom Party-led provincial government’s interpretation of a constitutional clause guaranteeing traditional leaders ex-officio representation in rural local government.
The court’s decision will have significant repercussions, not only for KwaZulu-Natal, but for the position of traditional leaders throughout the country. The ANC says it is fighting for the “triumph of democracy over feudalism”, while the IFP says it is contesting the case to prevent Western democratic values from usurping the “God- given” powers of traditional leaders.
ANC officials also said this week that the outcome of the case could lead to conflict in rural areas in the run-up to local government elections in the province next month.
The issue represents one of the most fundamental contradictions between the two parties. Left ambiguous by the drafters of the interim Constitution, the issue has continued to plague relations between traditionalists and modernists, and has provided perpetual fodder for KwaZulu-Natal’s political stalemate.
With less than two months to go before the May 29 local government elections, the Constitutional Court will be called on to make one of the trickiest decisions, in political terms, of its two-year lifespan. ANC local government spokesman Mike Sutcliffe said the court’s decision would signal whether “feudalism, pure democracy, or a system of democratic representation which allows access to feudal structures will triumph in the new South Africa”.
Clause 182 of the interim Constitution provides that “the traditional leader of a community observing a system of indigenous law and residing on land within the area of jurisdiction of an elected local government … shall ex officio be entitled to be a member of that local government, and shall be eligible to be elected to any office of such local government”.
IFP local government MEC Peter Miller has been given the mandate to interpret this clause in determining how many traditional leaders are represented on the province’s eight regional councils. Miller says the clause means all of the province’s estimated 300 amakhosi (chiefs) will be automatic members of second tier local government.
“I am obligated by the Constitution to accommodate traditional leaders,” he said. According to the current multiparty agreement, he added, the balance of elected officials will ensure that traditional leaders comprise only 20% of regional councils — effectively providing for some regional councils with as many as 250 members.
The IFP, whose traditional support base includes most of the province’s chiefs and indunas, stands to shore up its position in most regional councils if traditional leaders comprise 20% of officials. Mostly conservative landowners make up a further 10% and IFP elected officials an additional percentage.
The ANC would have to win — or control via alliances — more than 70% of elected seats on a regional council dominated by pro-IFP chiefs and landowners in order to hold the balance of power in the council.
Sutcliffe argues that such a ratio would see this constitutional clause negating the democratic ethos of the Constitution: “What is important here is not simply the wording of the clause, but the intent of the drafters. Surely democratic local government means the vast majority of politicians must be elected?”