Only four out of 100 "born-frees" in the Western Cape are registered to vote in next year's elections.
|||Cape Town - Only four out of 100 “born-frees” in the Western Cape are registered to vote in next year’s elections.
This is the lowest among the provinces where on average 10 percent of voters between 18 and 19 are ready to vote.
The Independent Electoral Commission was concerned at the slow rate of registration among young people, said spokeswoman Kate Bapela, adding the country’s democracy was dependent on the participation of the youth.
The Western Cape’s two biggest political parties both launched their election campaigns aimed at young voters over the past few months. The ANC was using Mxit while the DA created a film as part of its Know Your DA campaign.
The IEC worked out its percentages by comparing the number of registered voters to the number of people of voting age in each ward as counted by Census 2011.
IEC deputy chief electoral officer Norman du Plessis said they released the statistics recently to help parties plan their election campaigns.
The commission also plans to release maps depicting the most common home language and second language per ward.
“It aims to assist political parties with posters and pamphlets in the “right” language in specific areas,” he said.
According to the IEC, 31 million people in South Africa were eligible to vote of which 74 percent, or 23 million, were registered to vote.
In the Western Cape 70 percent, or 2.7 million out of 3.8 million people who are 18 years and older, have registered.
Registration levels among 18 and 19 year olds in the province are much lower, only 4 percent, or 8 105 of a possible 189 386 have registered.
The Western Cape has the lowest percentage of teens registered followed by Gauteng with 5 percent and Mpumalanga with 8 percent.
In the Eastern Cape 15 percent of teens were ready to vote - the highest of all the nine provinces, while in the five other provinces 10 percent and more of teenagers have registered.
South Africans in their twenties are more likely to register than teenagers, the IEC’s statistics show.
Nationally over half of the over nine million voters between the ages of 20 and 29 have registered.
In the Western Cape four out of every 10 of the one million eligible voters in their twenties have registered, while eight of 10 people who are 30 years and older have registered.
The IEC has also identified municipalities and electoral wards across the country where registration levels are low. Du Plessis said the IEC “would have preferred to go down to municipal level but political parties insisted on ward level”.
Statistician-General Pali Lehohla said the Census 2011 data and IEC voter registration numbers was difficult to compare on ward level because many people registered near their workplace while the Census counted people at their homes.
He said the Census also counted foreigners.
In Paarl’s ward 3 in the Drakenstein Municipality only 39 percent, or 2 980 of a possible 7 504, have registered, the lowest registration rate of all wards in the city.
Other wards with low registration are ward four in Malmesbury, ward 13 in George and wards eight and nine in Ceres.
cobus.coetzee@inl.co.za
Cape Times