I hope it survives the raging constitutional review hurricane.
All evidence suggests that as their shrill demands for a constitutional review gain momentum and reach new heights, our opposition parties, who are admittedly in a buoyant mood, will also be tempted to go broke as to want to replace our current First-Past ÔÇôthe-Post electoral system with Proportional Representation.
That, I think, would be a gross mistake.
In fact, should they succeed the real loser will not be the BDP, which they seem to have found a new nerve to smash and ultimately finish down. Rather in untold terms the loser will be the voter.
It should be emphasised that our constituency based First Past the Post is by no means perfect. No one system is!
The system is flawed, not least because it begets glaring unfairness in its election results.
By its very nature, the system engenders the many advantages of the incumbent and promotes all the evils of arrogance that come as part of a package of “winner takes all.”
Last year’s general election is perhaps the most glaring example of just how unfair First Past the Post can be.
While the Botswana Democratic Party barely secured 53% of the popular vote, the party went on to control close to 80% of the seats in parliament, and this before we even start to talk about an aberration that allows people to get into parliament through the back door as “Specially Elected” members of parliament.
The upshot of its inherent unfairness is that the system is also potentially divisive.
Many years on, the Kingdom of Lesotho is still to fully recover from the aftermaths of political unrests that rocked that country after political parties that had lost under the system felt the election results did not reflect and account for their share of the popular vote.
But for all its shortcomings, First Past the Post is by far the most efficient system for a country that wants to bring politicians closer to the people. It is also a system of choice when a country wants power to remain with the voters.
The new BCP leader, Dumelang Saleshando, has long been deeply impressed by Proportional Representation, although in many instances after realising its many weaknesses he has liked to shift and tampered his arguments with doses of what he likes to vaguely refer to as a hybrid.
From what we know about them so far there is no doubt that given their mutual hatred for the BDP, it is a foregone conclusion that the BMD will take its cue from Saleshando and his BCP.
That would be a fatal mistake. While it would be irresponsible for one to dismiss the rather piercing public crescendos for a constitutional review, it is important to emphasise that electoral system changes should not be introduced solely for purposes of political entertainment.
A smouldering hatred for the BDP should not blind BMD and BCP to change, perhaps in a feat of anger those things that have served us well, especially when such things are set to be replaced with what we will be regretting shortly.
The flaws found in Proportional Representation are so huge that put side by side with our constituency based system, the evils highlighted above pale in oblivion.
First and foremost, Proportional Representation takes the power away from the voter and gives it to political parties.
Under this system People go to the polls not to vote for the candidates they know, but rather for a list of names drawn at party head offices.
Given the shocking absence of inter-party democracy that cuts across our political spectrum it is not far-fetched to say that for most of our political parties such lists will mainly be drawn by and for political friends.
In a democracy, power should always rest with the voter, yet the first thing that Proportional Representation does is to take that power away from the voter and give it to party head offices.
Because it tends to blur as to totally erode the link between the voter and their representative in parliament, Proportional Representation also tends to kill accountability.
Under this system, members of parliament feel more accountable to their party secretariats and party bosses who draw up election lists than to people who vote.
Because under the system it is the party bosses who pay the piper they also naturally tend to be the ones calling the tune.
For the above reasons our current system is far much better than what is being bandied about, not least because it gives power to the voter, allows for a direct link between the voter and their representative and also enhances accountability of MPs to constituencies.
We hope it survives the changes envisaged by the constitutional review.
