To vote or not to vote – that should not be the question

I’m writing this as one of four Jewish members of parliament. All the Jewish MPs happen to be members of the official opposition.

Over the past few months, I’ve spent a lot of time engaging with voters within the Jewish community and outside. I’m the head of a constituency which includes the Atlantic Seaboard and has a very large group of Jewish ratepayers and voters.

I have tried to convince everyone who is registered to vote to at least come out and vote and to consider very carefully the value of that vote and the placement of same.

Obviously, we all have a choice whether to vote or not, and indeed the choice as to where we will place our cross. I implore everyone to consider their vote carefully before making a final decision. In essence, your vote is valuable and will count.

These local government elections are being challenged by numerous smaller parties and independent candidates. The splitting of these votes mean that the individual vote becomes more and more powerful.

My advice to everyone, regardless of their final decision, is to think carefully through a couple of factors. Local government elections should obviously be about service delivery. Clearly, service delivery will always be weighed up against the finances available and clean governance.

My strong feeling is that voting for a small and insignificant party or an independent will produce no results whatsoever. There might be a feel-good factor at the time of voting, but should this individual by chance get a seat, that seat will probably be meaningless with regard to service delivery in the long run. Remember, these individuals will take the seat for five years.

When voting for a larger political party, it would be useful to take into consideration their history of service delivery as opposed to the numerous hollow promises we are all seeing on an hourly basis.

Most of us want to live in cities which offer clean governance and as much service delivery as possible. When exercising your vote, you need to bear in mind that what you really want is to ensure that there is prevention of chaos and anarchy, and that you will have some access to the party thereafter.

Please look at the overall picture. It doesn’t help to find small faults with particular city councillors and thereby slate the whole party. Look at the bigger picture, and become part of the solution.

It behoves our community to have a positive attitude, and to ensure that it lends its vote to an individual and a party which can aspire to the goals of a city which has a clean audit and keeps striving for better delivery.

I fully understand the two issues raised in Ethics of Our Fathers. We all know Rabbi Chanina’s statement in which he calls for us to pray for the stability and welfare of government.

My understanding is that we require a government that can prevent chaos and anarchy. Unfortunately, we have just had a taste of that chaos and anarchy, and this needs to be prevented now and in the future.

I also understand the ancient Jewish practice of keeping a low profile with regard to government. In Pirkei Avot, Shemayah’s words, “Do not become overly familiar with the government” need to be understood. We must preserve our morals and values, but likewise, we should be looking to a political party which we believe would be in a position to at least understand these morals and values and try to implement them.

• Michael Bagraim is a member of parliament for the DA.