Former high court judge Dennis Davis on Monday (29 March 2021) delivered the Frederik Van Zyl Slabbert (FVZS) honorary lecture to mark the ten-year anniversary of the Frederik Van Zyl Slabbert Institute in the Stellenbosch University (SU) Centre for Student Leadership, Experiential Education and Citizenship.

 The annual lecture not only celebrates the life and values of the late Dr Van Zyl Slabbert, a former Chancellor of SU, but also seeks to encourage critical and stimulating dialogue about our country and continent.

 The theme for this year's lecture was “Electoral reform: How democratic responsiveness facilitates responsible governance", also paying homage to Van Zyl Slabbert's extensive work in this field. In his welcoming address, Prof Wim de Villiers, Rector and Vice-Chancellor of SU, said that the issue of facilitating responsible governance seemed more pressing now than ever before. “Reverend Jesse Jackson once said: 'Leadership cannot just go along to get along. Leadership must meet the moral challenge of the day.' That is what Frederik Van Zyl Slabbert did, and that is the work that his legacy informs – the work that is continued in his name to this day."

He added that Van Zyl Slabbert's contribution as an agent of change in the recent history of South Africa should not be underestimated. “His reputation has withstood the test of time, and his legacy has influenced and inspired an exciting new generation of leaders and thinkers. He was a passionate advocate for democracy throughout his career, and his engagement with social issues is a testament to this. This legacy has influenced the work that the Institute does and will continue to do."

In his lecture, Davis illustrated how the “famous Slabbert Commission on electoral reform has become the central feature of so much of our debate about electoral reform". He referred to the Constitutional Court judgment of last year, where the majority of the court declared the Electoral Act unconstitutional to the extent that it allowed adult citizens to be elected to the National Assembly and provincial legislatures only through membership of political parties.

“So, effectively, the Constitutional Court said you cannot have an electoral system that mandates only one route to get to the National Assembly through election, namely by being a member of a political party. It gave Parliament a period of time to fix this and to accommodate the idea of independent candidates."

He said there had since been a series of proposals put forward, as Parliament was now obliged to align the Electoral Act with the Constitutional Court's majority judgment. “Two proposals stand out – one led by Roelf Meyer, and another by the Helen Suzman Foundation. What is significant about these proposals is that they recall, in clear detail, that which Dr Van Zyl Slabbert and his team recommended so many years ago when they sought to exploit the idea that proportional representation did not have to be only by party lists; that it was important for the principle of accountability to have a component of the electoral system based on constituency as well."

Although Davis questioned whether this proposed system would facilitate greater levels of accountable governance, he had no doubt that it would reduce the influence of party bosses. ​