Chair, the right of every citizen to vote is one of the foremost rights for which the struggle against apartheid was fought. It is a right which we believe is essential to uphold in its entirety.
Section 19 of the Constitution ensures that all citizens have the right to vote in elections for every and any legislative body. Presently, the Bill restricts the rights of some citizens to vote only on the National Assembly ballot. This unfairly limits the ability of citizens to exercise their right. As such, this Bill is unconstitutional and cannot be supported.
Firstly, according to the Bill, South African citizens that are abroad are restricted from voting on the ballot for provincial legislatures. This is an unacceptable restriction on the right accorded to them by the Constitution as citizens of the Republic. During committee deliberations, the DA's argument was not accepted on the grounds that it was impractical, despite the fact that we offered very practical solutions to allow citizens abroad to register and vote on the provincial ballot.
Secondly, the current system and the Electoral Amendment Bill restrict South African citizens who reside in the Republic from fully exercising their right to vote. While the Bill now provides for a special vote for citizens who will be absent from their voting districts on the day of elections, it still restricts citizens from casting their vote outside their province. The DA believes that there should be no restriction whatsoever on the ability of citizens to exercise their right to vote, including voting from outside one's province. The DA thus believes that this is a major restriction on every citizen's Constitutional rights.
In order to ensure that these rights were upheld in legislation, the DA's hon James Selfe introduced a private member's Bill which, amongst others, aimed to ensure that all citizens - abroad and within the Republic - would vote in both the National Assembly and provincial legislature elections, regardless of provincial boundaries. This Bill was rejected by the committee.
Undeterred, the DA attempted to uphold the rights of all South Africans by proposing amendments in the committee to the current Electoral Amendment Bill so as to ensure that all the citizens can fully exercise their right to vote. Again, these amendments were rejected. The DA will now continue to fight in the courts to ensure that South Africa's elections are free, fair and allow all citizens full access to voting.
During the committee process, the commission itself conceded that this restriction on the rights of citizens is a problem, but described the issue as minute. As such, the ANC chose to ignore what everyone confesses is indeed being a problem. The Bill in its current form will not pass the test of constitutional muster.
The IEC and the ANC argue that with the low numbers of people who vote abroad and outside their home provinces, such a problem is immaterial. This is simply not true. More importantly, this belies the very intention on which the Constitution was founded. It undermines the lives lost in the struggle to ensure that the right to vote was never again restricted. The DA will not stand back and allow our democracy to be weakened by this Bill. Therefore, the DA cannot support this Bill.
We urge the House to do the right thing and reject this Bill as unconstitutional and unacceptable in our democracy. Thank you, Chair. [Applause.]