Universal adult suffrage on a common voters roll is one of the foundational values of our entire constitutional order. The achievement of the franchise has historically been important both for the acquisition of the rights of full and effective citizenship by all South Africans regardless of race, and for the accomplishment of an all-embracing nationhood. The universality of the franchise is important not only for nationhood and democracy. The vote of each and every citizen is a badge of dignity and of personhood. Quite literally, it says that everybody counts. In a country of great disparities of wealth and power it declares that whoever we are, whether rich or poor, exalted or disgraced, we all belong to the same democratic South African nation; that our destinies are intertwined in a single interactive polity.
It is a pity that The New Age, the planned newspaper which has positioned itself as “broadly supportive of the government”, did not appear today as planned because of the resignation of 5 senior editors (including the editor-in-chief and the deputy editor) yesterday, just a few hours before the first edition had to go to print. South Africa needs a more diverse print media and judging from its website, the new product would have provided a lively but credible new voice to the media landscape.
I was rather startled though when I went to The New Age website and a window popped up with the following advertisement.
That was quick.