In just 10 years arguably one of the most highly politicised generations of youth has given way to one in which apathy is unprecedented and disenchantment with politics is acute.
On Thursday the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) revealed that just below half the young people eligible to register to vote had done so during the final mass registration drive last weekend.
Surveys and low voter registration rates among young people reveal that while youth are aspirational, organised politics turns two in three right off. Last year Yfm commissioned Dino Fivaz of Logistix Kids to survey a representative sampling of 800 young people between 18 and 24. They included the employed, unemployed and students. Almost all (98%) believe some government officials are not honest.
Young voters comprise 36% of the eligible voting pool and the IEC reported a good take-up rate among young people in its final effort to register the seven-million eligible voters not on the roll. This suggests that with focused effort young people can be drawn into the systems of citizenship.
According to Census 2001 more than seven-million South Africans are between the age of 18 and 25; 48% of these people had registered by the end of last weekend.
The stock explanation of ”apathy” does not fit as most youth are aspirational and hopeful. Instead the trend points to boredom with organised politics, both in their political parties and their student and youth wings.
”Irrespective of where the youth come from … they have goals and aspirations,” says Angela Stewart-Buchanan, media director at loveLife.
”Young people switch off from doom-and-gloom messaging.”
She says that young people see the future in a positive light, and they want to know that there are opportunities for them to improve their lives. The aspirations are an education, a career and a family.
Frustrated dreams may hold the key to the disenchantment with politics. In the loveLife survey, less than half of those surveyed believed they had limitless opportunities while 26% said their prospects were limited.
The most pressing concerns the youth face include HIV/Aids (33%) and teenage pregnancies (30%). Crime rates only concern 17% while concern about violence affects 8%.
Getting a good education is the number one priority of 63%, but living a responsible life was only rated as important by 1% of those surveyed.
Young adults are moving their focus from social and political development issues. They distrust ”official” voices and only listen to voices that they believe that they can trust.
Political interest and faith in the government has decreased since 2000, according to the Yfm survey.
Ninety-eight percent of 18- to 24-year-olds surveyed by Yfm believe that some government officials are not honest. Only 25% of the same age group think that things have improved since 1994.
Two-thirds of young people feel that politics is not important to them at all, suggesting the youth do not connect the realisation of their aspirations with delivery by the government.
Dirk Hartford, CEO of Yfm, says youth are a minority whereas 10 years ago they formed the majority of voters. ”Those who are cynical don’t really care and those who care want to see their interests being carried out.”
Thato ”Fresh” Sikwane, Yfm’s breakfast show presenter, says the youth are not interested in the ideology and rhetoric of political parties, but wanted to hear them addressing their direct concerns. ”Essentially,” he says, ”young people want to know what political parties are gonna do for them.”
Hartford says people over the age of 18 are concerned about their future. ”They are worried about education, crime, jobs and HIV/Aids.”
The African National Congress is the most popular party among the youth. ”But we do get people phoning [Yfm] from the Democratic Alliance, the Pan Africanist Congress and the Azanian People’s Organisation.” Hartford says new parties enjoy little support. ”I’ve heard one lone voice supporting the Independent Democrats.”
The latest SABC/Markinor survey among 3 500 respondents over 18 confirms this. It found that 48% of voters who were not going to register did not want to vote. Of these 44% were aged between 18 and 24.
More than 20-million people are on the voters’ roll. Youth between the ages of 18 and 25 accounted for almost 60% of new registrations, according to the IEC.
My X is not in Orania
Yolandi Groenewald (24) — Mail & Guardian journalist
Dozens of omies and tannies complain that we are a leaderless generation without morals or directions, who abuse die soetste taal [the sweetest language].
Sometimes I can understand where the groan generation come from. They grew up in an environment where individuals had strong feelings about who they voted for. You were either a Sap [South Africa Party, which later became the United Party] or a Nat [National Party], and later a Nat or a Conservative.
But that generation does not understand where we come from. We had a little Volk and Vaderland (I can still remember the words of Jong Suid Afrika), but our teen years have been consumed by the politics of change and reconciliation.
This year I have to decide where my political loyalties lie. We long for a party with principles and morals, a party that will not desert us in the middle of a term to score political points.
For us strong principles and morals does not mean a return to conservative Afrikaner views. It means sticking to your promises.
I want my party to be taken seriously by the government of the day. Many times I have listened to the Democratic Alliance make valid criticisms, but it too often gets lost in their general moan and groan.
Many of my friends are shifting towards the Freedom Front Plus. ”At least you know where you stand with them,” one said. But that means a dorpie called Orania.
For the life of me I cannot see myself packing up and living in isolation while trying to grow my own vegetable garden. I considered voting for the African National Congress, an act that would condemn me as a traitor, but the party makes me feel like an outsider trying to fit into a crowd I do not belong to.
I have already registered and will definitely vote, as will all my friends. But where I will draw my cross is less than clear.
Blah ANC blah blah
Fikile Mbalula* — African National Congress Youth League secretary-general
As has become traditional among the opponents of the African National Congress, the role of youth in politics as well as their support for the ANC is one terrain where there is fierce political contestation.
It makes sense for the youth of our country to vote for the ANC as this is the only organisation that represents their aspirations.
By definition, the youth have a greater claim on the future of our country and their vote for the ANC since 1994 has been a demonstration of their confidence. Young people know that 10 years are insufficient to redress all the ills of decades of apartheid misrule because they know the depth of racial oppression from the personal experiences of living in underdeveloped areas.
The youth appreciate the strides taken by the government to speed up their own development through programmes such as learnerships, the establishment of the Umsobomvu Youth Fund, among others.
Registration trends have disputed the notion that young people are politically apathetic. They will continue to determine their own destiny. And to them this destiny is synonymous with the ANC’s.
* Fikile Mbalula was asked to write about his personal approach to politics, but provided this article
No one’s talking to us
Nawaal Deane (28) — Mail & Guardian journalist
My girlfriends and I were sitting at a coffee shop last December reminiscing about 1994, when decisions were so easy.
It was our first year of university when we patriotically voted for the African National Congress — confident that the new government would pave the way for a better future for all.
But this year we are stumped — who will we vote for come April? We laughingly compared the ANC to an abusive lover — wanting to trust and love it but feeling constantly betrayed by its failure to provide treatment for people with Aids or to deliver jobs, and blatantly spending copious amounts of money on the arms deal.
As young, black, single professionals we acknowledged that none of the parties is speaking to us.
On principle I registered to vote because I believe in this democracy. The process of voting — registering and going to vote (even if it means spoiling a ballot) — is important to me because while I may not believe in any particular party, I want to uphold the institutions and processes of democracy.
No land for me, no vote
Molefe Pilane (28) — Landless People’s Movement North-West provincial chairperson and national council member
Growing up in the Bophuthatswana ”homeland” or Bantustan, we were told that we were not part of the Republic of South Africa. But the popular uprising that led to the collapse of that Bantustan in 1994 was inspired by our belief that we were separated from the rest of the population so that the white minority could occupy most of the land. The cry for reincorporation of the Bantustan was a cry to ”liberate every piece of land that we have known was stolen by the white settlers from black people”. It was this cry that led many of us as youth to join the liberation movements after their unbanning in 1990.
I was born in 1975 in Tlhabane township near Rustenburg in a household of seven family members. I was part of the youth uprising, and I have not forgotten the cries of our people for land.
That’s why I joined the Landless People’s Movement (LPM).
I share the frustrations of most of the youth I meet in the North-West province, who feel that the present government has not delivered.
Most of the people we meet when we mobilise in our province feel that the 2004 elections should be boycotted because these promises have not been delivered.
Youth really feel that nothing has changed since 1994. They are demoralised and try to find comfort in things like alcohol, activities like parties and so on. The spread of HIV/Aids is the end result of this. The future looks very bleak for the majority of the poor, illiterate and landless youth. The LPM’s voice is echoing their own sentiments by saying ”No Land! No Vote!”
This generation needs icons
Justin Nurse (26) — Founder of Laugh It Off, satirical T-shirt company
South African history textbooks may now teach about Codesa [Convention for a Democratic South Africa] rather than Kitchener’s ”scorched earth” policy — but while you can present our youth with the information, you can’t make them care.
South Africa’s youth aren’t interested in the Hefer commission. Madiba is a figurehead championing the fight against HIV/Aids; Thabo Mbeki a president rarely seen on home soil. Tony Leon is who you must vote for to create a strong opposition; Patricia de Lille is an Independent Democrat known for fighting crime. These are political factoids that may inform a young South African’s vote on election day — but is registering to vote anywhere near as exciting as the final in the Lord of the Rings trilogy?
South Africa’s youth are more interested in the trappings of consumer society than the internal politics of government.
A South African youth more concerned with brands and ”downloadable ringtones” does not necessarily mean a lack of interest in the politics of our country. Provided the issues and the political players are marketed in the right way, they will get the youth’s attention. Politics needs to be pop culture if it is to find a place in the hearts and minds of young South Africans. The youth need icons: political parties with a strong brand identity and marketing appeal; leaders they know they can trust.
The political circus of corruption, floor-crossing and commissions of inquiry that a young South African might encounter further fuels suspicion of the political system. More often than not this translates into apathy, the ”lazy boy” option for our MTV generation.
The dealings I have with South Africa’s youth often leave me pleasantly surprised.
At several of the secondary and tertiary institutions Laugh it Off visits we often uncover stories of societies that have been formed to increase HIV/Aids awareness, or to raise funds for social-awareness campaigns.
At the core of these student bodies are individual young South Africans ready to take politics by the scruff of the neck, keen to find their own meaning of the word, and willing to make a positive difference in their immediate environment.