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OPINION: Farouk Cassim writes that every political party should focus sharply on smart economic development approaches. Politicking at the local government level is a zero-sum game.

The local government system provides for direct voting for an individual representative but, overall, it hasn’t contributed to better outcomes for voters, says JP Landman.

Pity the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC). They have about 30 days to prepare, print and distribute ballot papers for more than 60 000 candidates vying to capture one of the more than 9 000 councillors posts up for election. Those ballots must get to more than 20 000 voting districts in 257 municipalities across the country. The local government elections on 1 November is no small logistical endeavour. The more than 60 000 candidates are linked to 1 482 political parties and ratepayers’ organisations. Imagine if each organisation had a distinct logo that mu...

Former member of Parliament and now councillor for five years, Farouk Cassim said the impact was enormous and needed a drastic mind-shift and urgency to tackle.

GroundUp publishes original public interest news. We mainly cover education, health, sanitation, immigration and human rights stories.