PICTURE: FREDLIN ADRIAAN Are elections here meant to serve South Africans — or are South Africans meant to serve those who run, and run in, elections?A couple of words from a senior Electoral Commission of SA (IEC) official in a radio interview on Monday summarised all that is wrong with the way elections are run. Responding to campaigns against registering in some local areas during the weekend’s registration drive, he thanked those who registered for doing their "patriotic duty".A patriotic duty is something we are expected to do for our country — usually what people in authority believe everyone else should do so that they don’t have to do it themselves. But a vote is not a duty, it is a right. It is not something we have to do, it is something we have the right to do. Whether we choose to use it or not, voting is, arguably, the most important right because it establishes us as citizens entitled to get those in power to work for us rather than resigning ourselves to working for t...
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