By Marimuthu Subramoney
(aka Subry Govender)
Election posters are everywhere. Travel through the CBDs of the cities and towns, and townships, residential areas, and informal settlements one is overcome by a sea of election posters of the different political parties hanging from every almost light pole.
All the political parties - from the ruling ANC to the newly-established NFP - are all making promises to woo the voters.
"Let's work together", "We deliver for all", "Unite and fight" and "Stop corruption" are just some of the catch phrases that the different political are using in their attempts to attract the voters.
The political parties are also taking every opportunity that come their way through special radio and television programmes and newspapers to get their messages across to the voters.
The local government elections on May 18 will be the third such election since we attained our new non-racial and democratic freedom in 1994.
I interacted with a cross-section of people over the past few weeks in order to get an idea of how the ordinary people or the "person in the street" view the political parties and how they would exercise their democratic right.
"I have voted in every election since 1994 but this time round I am not interested at all," Mr Zeph Gumede, a 47-year-old factory worker told me in an interview.
Mr Gumede is married with three adult children and two grand-children. He lives in a disadvantaged area in the eThwekini municipality.
"I am not going to vote because very little has changed in my area for the past 17 years. We have been waiting for a sewer system and running water for every household for a long time but nothing has been done. We only have electricity.
"I will not vote because I want to demonstrate my disillusionment with what is going on. Many other community members also feel the same way. We are all ANC supporters and cannot see ourselves voting for any other party. We want the ANC to know that we are unhappy with the manner in which our concerns have not been attended to."
Mr Krish Govender is a 45-year-old community worker who lives in Ottawa with his wife and a teenage son and daughter. He has been an anti-apartheid activist all his life and has also voted in all the elections since 1994.
"I am going to vote in the forthcoming election but it's not for any political party. I will be voting because the candidate is a good person and I want to give him a chance. My organisation has let me down. It seems that what we fought for during the anti-apartheid struggle days has all been forgotten. Most of the people are now only interested in furthering their own nests and have very little time for the poor and the marginalised."
Mr Pravesh Maharaj of Woodview in Phoenix is another disenchanted South African. This 50-year-old father of three teenage daughters also voted for change in 1994. But he too is now deeply disappointed with all the reports of mismanagement, fraud, corruption, and the failure of the eThekwini municipality to clean the streets and generally maintain a healthy environment.
But, unlike most people I spoke to he's not going to abstain from voting.
"I want to vote in the hope of making a difference. There's a need for us to send a message to the powers that be that we have had enough. They cannot take us for granted."
Forty-two-year-old Lucky Khumalo of an informal settlement in La Mercy works as a caddy at the Windsor Park Golf Course in Durban. He's at the golf course every day in the hope of carrying "a bag or two" so that he can earn some money to feed his wife and two children, aged seven and sixteen months.
"I'm forced to work as a caddy after losing my job recently. I am a proud South African but am very unhappy that I cannot find another decent job.
"If I vote, will it make any difference to my life and that of my family? I will only be improving the life of the candidate and his family."
Ms Ntombi Sibaya is a 32-year-old resident of Waterloo. She works as a petrol attendant in Umdloti Beach.
"I have registered and I will vote for the party that has done so much for us since 1994. I am not interested in all the talk about corruption and wastage of ratepayers' money. It seems the black man is always a suspect."
But expressing a view at the other end of the scale is Mr Preven Naidoo, a newly-married person who lives in Brindahaven, Verulam.
"I have not decided to vote yet but if I do then it will certainly not be for people who are messing up our towns and cities. I am fed up with all the deterioration and degeneration of our towns and filth that is found everywhere.
"Nothing is being done to show us that they want to make our towns and residential areas a better place for all of us."
Mr Gordon Pillay is a 60-year-old grand-father who lives in Caneside, Phoenix.
"I was also an activist in the early days in Merebank and in 1994 I voted for the ANC. But now I am totally disillusioned with what is taking place here in Phoenix. The eThekwini Municipality is turning this crowded residential area into a slum by building houses in every open space. Our children and grand-children don't have open spaces and parks to play sport any more.
"I am disappointed that no one is taking up this issue. They want to destory this residential area by over-crowding an already over-crowded suburb. We at the moment are being over-whelmed by drug lords and illegal taverns. We are paying rates and taxes but we are not being treated properly."
Most people, it seems, are concerned that they are being over taxed and are now even being unfairly charged for refuse removal as well.
"What are we paying exhorbitant rates for?," asked Ms Natchandramal Narainsamy, who lives in central Verulam.
"What are they doing with all the rates and taxes we are paying?"
The over-whelming view is that the rates' money collected is not being used productively to provide basic necessities such as sanitation, drinking water, and electricity for the poorest of the poor and cleaner streets, recreational and sporting facilities, a crime-free environment, and employment opportunities for all the residents.
There's no doubt that the vast majority of people are disillusioned and dissatisfied with the kind of service they are receiving from local municipalities and they want to make their views known in different ways during the election on May 18.
One just hopes that those who come into power and the candidates of other political parties who win seats will remember that they are there to work in the interests of the ratepayers and not to further enrich their own interests, their families and their hangers on.
We cannot allow the dream of Nelson Mandela to be deferred any longer. - Subry Govender, Chief Editor
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