Large number of candidates a concern

DEMOCRACY is about popular participation – the right of every adult person not only to vote but also stand for elections to represent a community, an electorate, district or province.
Parliamentary democracy is about effective representation of voters.
In PNG, the element of popular participation in our national elections is no doubt very effective, and this is reflected in the number of candidates.
However, the concept of effective representation appears to be diminishing progressively with every election.
There are two inter-related reasons for this.
The large number of candidates not only shows how easy it is to stand for elections but also highlights the competitiveness of the process of becoming a representative in parliament.
This implies the lack of criteria for voting of representatives in terms of their credibility for leadership or if there is, voters are unaware of such control measures.
Secondly, to have a large number of independent candidates win just makes it more difficult to know what representatives stand for and how they expect to make the parliamentary system work well for the people.
For a parliamentary system to function well, representatives must be members of a well-organised, stable political party.

Jacob Manase, Via email