Courts and Elections in South Africa: (cont. below)

...Political and associational rights and the Constitutional Court’s engagement with international and foreign law
With South Africa’s next national and provincial elections to be held on 29 May 2024, a seminar on 20 May 2024 is an apt occasion for Justice Rogers to survey the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court lying behind the innovations which will characterise the imminent elections. The survey will start with the Court’s judgment of June 2020 in New Nation Movement [2020] ZACC 11, which concluded that South Africa’s Electoral Act was unconstitutional for failing to make provision for independent candidates. This was found to be inconsistent with the political and associational rights guaranteed in sections 19 and 18 of the Bill of Rights, viewed in the context of the Constitution as a whole. The Court had regard to international and foreign law, particularly regarding the right of association.
Following New Nation Movement, the Electoral Amendment Act of 2023 introduced amendments to cater for independent candidates in the context of a system primarily based on party contestation and proportional representation. These amendments gave rise to constitutional challenges addressed in two judgments handed down by the Constitutional Court in December last year, One Movement SA [2023] ZACC 42 and Independent Candidate Association [2023] ZACC 42. The focus of these judgments was whether the amendments violated the political rights of independent candidates and voters, particularly (a) by imposing what was alleged to be an unduly burdensome and unjustified signature requirement for the right to appear on the ballot and (b) by allegedly requiring an independent candidate, in substance if not in form, to get double the number of votes in order to win a seat. On the former question, considerable use was made, in the majority judgment, of international and foreign law.
Sfiso Nxumalo, who served as a judicial law clerk at the Constitutional Court when judgment in New Nation Movement was handed down, will be the discussant at this event.