Support for elections falls among frustrated Lesotho citizens, who want a more powerful king
More than 10 years of unstable coalition governments and army interference in the running of the country has prompted growing public sentiment for a stronger monarchy in Lesotho‚ an Afrobarometer study has found. Key findings of the survey show the following: • Seventy-five percent of Basotho say the constitution should be amended to allow the king to have more say on issues of national importance. The survey authors noted that support for expanding the king’s powers is strong regardless of respondents’ location‚ gender and political party affiliation. • Seventy-five percent of Basotho say the involvement of Lesotho’s security forces in politics should decrease. • Two-thirds of Basotho say the country should switch from a proportional representation to a majoritarian electoral system in order to ensure a single-party government rather than a coalition government. Afrobarometer commented that three-quarters of its survey respondents believed coalition governments were more unstable (...
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