Dar es Salaam-19 October--The Southern Africa Development Community(SADC) Parliamentary Forum will be making recommendations for possible improvements in electoral management and electoral systems in southern Africa--a practical approach to addressing issues of democracy. Dr Kasuka Mutukwa, secretary-general of the forum, told journalists here today the parliamentary body would make a set of recommendations to its Plenary Assembly in November based on its observation of elections in Namibia, Mozambique, Mauritius and Zimbabwe.

SADC observer missions to the four countries have experienced first-hand, the workings of two principle electoral models currently in use in the region--the Westminster First-Past-The-Post and the Proportional Representation system.
One of the forum's concerns is the declining numbers of women in countries using the First-Past-The-Post system, with both Mauritius and Zimbabwe elections testifying to this fact.

Mutukwa said the goals set by the governments of SADC in the Gender Declaration, which would raise the number of women in all parliaments to at least 30 percent by 2005, are suffering set-backs in countries using the First-Past-The-Post system. Nine countries in SADC use this British model which is constituency-based.

In this year's parliamentary elections in Zimbabwe, the number of women tumbled from 14 percent of the 120 elective seats, to 10 percent.
Countries with the Proportional Systems have raised their gender profile -- South Africa and Mozambique both stand above 29 percent.
"Our concerns are that the Gender Declaration is going one way and the First-Past-The-Post is going the other way," Mutukwa lamented.

The List-Proportional Representation System employed by Angola, South Africa, Mozambique and Namibia, allows for the deliberate infusion of women through party lists while the First-Past-The-Post model subjects them to gruelling competition in Africa's male-dominated party structures and societies.

Tanzania however, provides for women by reserving 36 seats in Parliament for them through a proportional allocation. The bulk of the seats -- 231 of them -- are for open competition using the First-Past-The-Post.

The main worry for gender activists in the country is that there will only be 70 women among the 862 candidates, amounting to 8.1 percent.
"This (Election observation) is a milestone in the context of SADC to address democracy in a very practical way," Mutukwa said ahead of the October 29 presidential and parliamentary elections in Tanzania.

Mutukwa is coordinating a team of 30 members of parliament and 15 support staff, who will cover 15 regions of this massive country. The SADC Parliamentary Forum is a regional body composed of 12 national parliaments in southern Africa.

MPs constituting the SADC Parliamentary Forum Observer Mission are led by South Africa's Geoff Dodge, a member of the African National Congress (ANC). The group is a mixture of opposition and ruling party MPs from all member parliaments.

They will cover a vast territory of 945,090 sq km, with an ethnically diverse population, a third of which is Sunni Muslim and the rest mainly Christian.

Their findings and recommendations may be useful to a region that has, through its governments, committed itself to upholding the rule of law and promoting democratisation by signing the SADC Treaty. (SARDC)

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