Voting numbers are plummeting in South Africa

South Africa has seen a dramatic decline in voter turnout since the beginning of its democracy, with less than half of eligible voters making their mark in the 2024 general election.

According to the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC), voter turnout is the percentage of registered voters who cast their vote. This metric went from 89.3% in 1999 to 58.6% 25 years later.

In the months building up to the elections, citizens are required to register with the IEC if they would like to vote.

However, South Africa is one of the few countries to use the registered voter turnout metric, with the international standard using the total number of eligible voters as the denominator.

This is known as voting age population (VAP) turnout because it considers those who are above the eligible age to vote, which is 18 in South Africa.

In contrast to the IEC’s definition, it considers voter apathy when assessing participation in a nation’s democracy.

Using the VAP turnout definition, data from the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA) shows that voter turnout was at its highest in 1994 at 85.5%.

This figure steadily decreased over the next four elections, eventually dropping below 50% in 2019.

The 2024 election saw a record-low VAP turnout of 39.6%.

To put these figures into perspective, South Africa’s VAP increased by roughly 76% from 22.6 million to 39.8 million between 1999 and 2024.

While voter registration over the period did not increase proportionately, the figure grew by just over 50%.

Yet, the difference in votes cast between the two election years is a matter of tens of thousands, not millions. 

16,228,462 votes were cast in 1999, and 16,291,516 in 2024, an increase of 63,054, painting a bleak picture for voter participation in South Africa. 

This figure peaked in 2014 when 18.7 million people turned up to voting stations. However, the voter turnout, according to the IEC, was still lower than five years prior.

Apathy among the youth a major concern

A pre-election survey of youth by the Human Sciences Research Council found the most common reason for not voting was “poor government performance in addressing poverty, unemployment and corruption.”

According to the ACE Electoral Knowledge Network, which covers 230 countries, registering to vote is compulsory in more than half of these states.

In other countries, registering is voluntary, with some automatically compiling voter rolls. India, the world’s largest democracy is an example of this.

South Africa falls within those where voting is voluntary and can be done in-person or online, limiting the barriers to doing so.

While turnout has decreased over the course of the country’s democracy, 27.8 million South Africans registered to vote in 2024, the most in history.

Public Affairs Research Institute executive director, Sithembile Mbete, points to a strong registration drive by the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) after poor turnout during the 2021 local elections as the reason for this.

The point was made in a paper titled Making sense of voter turnout in the 2024 South African National and Provincial Elections published in the Journal of African Elections in 2024.

The IEC used social media campaigns and partnered with civil society organisations to encourage first-time voters under 30, a group historically underrepresented at voting stations, to register.

This somewhat paid off, as the IEC reported that 77% of new registrations came from people between 19 and 29, the largest VAP cohort, which consisted of over 11 million people in 2024.

However, while the IEC’s election drive convinced many, only half of South Africans under 30 registered to vote. 

In comparison, those between 30 and 39 had a 67% registration rate, 79% of people between 40 and 49 registered, 90% between 50 and 59 registered, and 93% between 60 and 69 registered.

A similar trend was observed in voter turnout, as per the IEC definition, with those between 18 and 29 having the lowest turnout and those between 70 and 79 the highest.

Mbete says the generational theory of voter participation, which suggests that people become increasingly interested in elections as they age, as a probable cause.

However, she argues that South Africa’s high levels of youth unemployment mean that many will not be able to “achieve the traditional markers of adulthood associated with electoral participation.”