2023-06-06 08:46:12
The current brouhaha as to “to put or not to put” an electoral process in place for the end of the year calls into question. Once again, by worrying about elective logics before worrying about governance and development logics, are we putting the cart before the zebus and we are stubbornly perpetuating a system whose deadly dimension we no longer have to prove?
This brouhaha is all the more absurd since, in order to maintain a reputedly unsuitable system, we are begging for subsidies from abroad to organize elections for which we are unable to finance the logistics.
Knowing full well that the expenses that certain candidates will incur risk being – if they find the funders capable of supporting them – much higher than the budget allocated to the organization of these elections [1]. Knowing full well that these budgets allocated to the organization of these elections should theoretically guarantee the transparency, fairness and inclusiveness of electoral operations… But knowing just as well that the excesses and tampering of some will not be controllable… Absurdity absolute.
Moreover, if, by the happiest of coincidences and despite the violent locking of the system by the clan now in charge of the country, a new power could emerge from this single-member two-round ballot in November, what would it in terms of political stability and in terms of stabilizing the socio-economic situation? Will the new power in place finally be able to carry out the inclusive policies that have been dreamed of for the country for 60 years? Or is there not a risk, despite a change in the cast of the film, of seeing the same dramatic comedy replayed. As we can see, the elections, in their current form, will probably not solve the problems of the country’s stability and its development. It is also obvious that this observation of the inefficiency of a ballot that changes nothing in people’s lives, an observation established by everyone, has a dramatic result: the political defection of the citizen. The low participation rates characterize a form of illegitimacy in the representation resulting from the ballot box.
Especially since, invariably, as at every pivotal moment in the history of Madagascar, most of the previous political personnel rallies to the new power. We have seen it in the constitution of the various parties at the head of the country created in alignment with the elected leader, a “providential” symbolic character. We saw it for the PSD, for the AREMA, the TIM, the HVM or the TGV/IRD/MAPAR which illustrate these logics of opportune alliances… “elections, trap…” says the popular expression. These elections, in their current form, will not change anything. The respectability, the legitimacy after which the actors run are still well compromised.
“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result”. We should make this quote attributed to Albert Einstein our own. Malagasy is deemed resilient. However, must it still and always relive the same electoral system, the same elections, the same campaigns, the same abuses for the same result: confinement in the same spiral of underdevelopment?
If the problem were therefore limited to the sole question of the quality of the organization of the ballot, we could be satisfied with compliance with the 27 recommendations of the EU electoral monitoring mission to Madagascar in May 2022. [2]. A system that meets these recommendations should be more transparent, more inclusive.
The demand for a process with proven transparency gives hope for an alternation of power that the oppositions are trying to achieve by all means, all initiatives, all alliances and all negotiations.
This alternation could ensure governance practices more likely to satisfy the essential duties of the State and in particular the duty to ensure the inclusive socio-economic development of the country and its corollary: the preservation of the Commons.
The accomplishment of this duty of the State, depends in fact on the will and the capacity of the elected representatives to really assume their responsibilities in front of their fellow citizens.
The question then arises of their representativeness. If the elected representatives carried the true choice of the voters, would they not be more responsible and more transparent in front of their fellow citizens? If the citizens could assume their choices and truly sanction by their vote the said elected officials and thus ensure real alternations, would the latter not better shoulder their responsibilities? Is it not the establishment of a form of representativeness closer to the requirements of true decentralization that will be able to resolve the question of better management of the Commons?
The problem of the representativeness of the people by the elected representatives obviously relates to the electoral system. Can the political representation resulting from the current system be considered as truly designated by the people? Can we simply affirm its legitimacy?
If the answer is no, why isn’t it? Is it because the system is flawed by corruption and tampering? Or does the problem not lie more in the choice of voting methods (ie single-member voting, proportional voting, majoritarian voting, etc.) or in the system of representation which determines how the electoral results are translated into seats or into the position of power.
What is the elective system [3] who would confer more legitimacy on the representation that would result from it? Certainly, the system currently in place, inherited from colonization and modeled on Western systems, seems far from the reality of our social structures.
On this postulate of the necessary overhaul of the electoral system, its hierarchies and its modalities, what system should be put in place? And how to set it up?
We owe Didier Galibert [4] the following statement ” [à Madagascar] the social group providing the cognitive framework within which political identities are forged is spontaneously located at the level of the basic identity categories, not at the scale of the […] nation […] »
In fact, the Malagasy citizen would hardly recognize himself in a system of national representation, especially since the BALANCED representation of local interests and national interests is absolutely not guaranteed and the current rupture between the citizen and the government is dramatically proven [5].
But this basic political identity category mentioned above, we know it: it is obviously the Fokonolona. Revaluing the Fokonolona, really putting this structure back at the center of the country’s political life, wouldn’t it be a way to seriously explore?
Make ALL elements of the hierarchy of elected powers electorally accountable to the Fokonolona – from the Commune to the President, including the Regional Councils, the Assembly and the Senate – by redefining the representativeness and eligibility of elected representatives at each level respectively , would it not offer a solution to this problem of accountability of elected officials to the people.
We might have chances to revalorize politics in the eyes of the Malagasy people and to encourage a return to feeling and national solidarity… We would have chances to compensate for the insincerity of the ballot… And chances to satisfy a closer representativeness of the cultural reality of the citizen.
Is it time to look for new ways that can, in the impetus of this change of legislature, ensure real representation of voters and allow us to get out of this deadly model of the providential man?
However, the political reconstruction of the country and the development of a true democratic culture can only be established in a STABLE manner if this work of aligning a system both with our values and traditions, but also with modernity is done. . Politics must be aligned with our culture and not the opposite… This is not the case with the current system strictly inherited from colonialism.
It is therefore time to establish a real diagnosis on the reality of the representativeness resulting from the current elections, beyond the methods of execution, beyond the transparency and inclusiveness required. Is it time to establish a real political debate to fix the vision on what the preservation of the Commons should be and on its modalities? It is time to consider implementing new modalities and elective hierarchies.
But how to carry out this debate, this diagnosis and set up these new methods? How to set up a new voting system? The very notion of transition being a word that annoys because, as we know, a transition will only lead to an eternal restart if we stick to the logic of representativeness in place….
The question of HOW therefore remains. Some seem to be beginning to sketch answers.
Patrick Rakotomalala (Lalatiana PitchBoule) – June 2023
#Ragidros #chronicles #Elections #Madness