- Paragraph 114 of the report of the Select Committee states

?One can also insert an additional guarantee to provide that the party having won the most seats at constituency level is guaranteed to have at least 50 % + 1 of the seats in the Assembly even where its PR figure is the lowest.?

It is unclear whether this clause applies to both models or to Model C only. Strangely, it appears neither in the constitutional amendment (Annex A) with respect to Model C nor in the proposal for Model A (Annex B).

This is constitutional engineering to artificially manufacture a majo-rity for a minority. It does not exist anywhere. The clause implies that a party with only 27% of votes in a four-cornered election can govern alone against 73% of people as long as it receives ?most seats at constituency level?. In a three-horse contest, it signifies that a party with 30% to 33% of votes can run the country alone against 67% to 70% of the electorate if it gains ?most seats at constituency level?.

It is fundamentally flawed. It is more vicious than it appears as it speaks not of a majority of seats.but ?the party having won MOST seats at constituency level?.

Mauritius has never had a government with a minority of votes. Six out of the eight elections since 1967 were won with over 50% of votes. In 1987, the MSM-LP-PMSD alliance garnered 49.9% of votes while the post election LP-PMSD coalition of 1976 had a combined 54.1% of national vote. A pre-election alliance was the winner in 7 out of the eight elections. The only exception was 1976 with a three-way battle and a post election coalition. Paragraph 114 therefore introduces a new concept unfamiliar to our electoral realities. And dangerously so in a plural society.

It is plain that a two-cornered contest will not cause a party that wins an absolute majority of FPTP seats to lose it after the PR allotment. To be accurate, it could happen only in an extreme case. Basically in a situation when the party that wins an absolute majority of FPTP seats has in fact POLLED FEWER votes than the other party! Then the allotment of the PR seats, which is done on the basis of votes cast, could reverse the situation. Is this unfair?

There is no country with mixed system that has such a dangerous provision. Mexico, a country of doubtful democratic credential, did try a similar formula in one general election in 1991; however it was given up at the next election of 1994 after many protests. Even in Mexico, there was a rider for a floor of 35% of votes. In other words, a party must win at least 35% to get a 50% + 1 seat majority. Today Mexico has an electoral system with two key features to ensure fairness. First, no party can win more than 60% of votes, regardless of its vote total. Second, the proportion of total seats in Parliament cannot exceed eight percentage points above its national percentage of vote. It defines maximum unfairness. In essence, a party needs to capture at least 42% of votes to be guaranteed a majority of 50% of seats + 1.

I shall illustrate with the case of elections in Scotland in 1999 under a mixed system. The total number of seats is 129 with 73 FPTP and 56 compensatory PR. It must be borne in mind that it was a Labour Party Government in London that introduced the mixed system in Scotland, knowing fully well the electoral realities of Scotland.

The following emerge from the table:

i) The Labour Party won 53 out of the 73 FPTP seats, or 72.6% of these seats.However, it won them with an average party vote of 33.6% only as it was a four party contest.

ii) The allotment of the PR seats, using a compensatory formula, rewards parties penalised by the FPTP mode. As Labour party won a disproportionate share of FPTP seats with relatively few votes, it received only 5.4% of PR seats..The SNP and the Conservatives were very penalized by the FPTP formula and were accordingly compensated by many PR seats; the Liberals also secured some seats.

iii) Even if Labour won an overwhelming number of FPTP seats, it did not capture an overall majority. It ended with 56 seats out of 126, representing 43.4% of the total. This is attributable to its relatively low 33.6% vote. It, however, captured more seats than its share of votes. It collected 43.4% of the seats with only 33.6% of the votes, thus giving a 9.8% seat premium.

Five broad lessons must be drawn from that example:

1. Nobody in the UK or in Scotland cried foul. The Labour Party of Scotland accepted the formula. There has been no attempt to change it to benefit Labour even if Tony Blair has a huge majority in the Commons to do that. No suggestion of incorporating something akin to clause 114 where the winner of FPTP is guaranteed 50% + 1 seats. Or to replace the compensatory mode by a parallel one.

2. Labour made a conscious choice of going alone because it wanted to govern alone. However with only 33.6% of the votes, it had to contract an alliance with the Liberals-Democrats to secure a majority in the Scottish Parliament. Had the alliance occurred before the elections, they would have won a huge majority with only 46% of votes.

3. Had the Labour Party polled a higher percentage of the votes (say 40%), it would have won an absolute majority on its own. There is no need to attain 50% to secure this majority as the first party always has a bonus of seats. In the above example, Labour has a bonus of almost 10% of seats; it captured 43.4% of seats with 336 % of vote.

4. Labour could have won 51% of FPTP seats (37) with only 28% of votes. It would then have received no PR seat as its vote share is too low.

5. The electoral system of Scotland reconciles the two objectives of stability and fairness. The share of FPTP to PR seats is 56.6% to 43.4% (73 FPTP and 56 PR) compared to 70% and 30% in Mauritius. However the rules are clear. A party does not govern alone if it has only 33.6% of the votes. It needs around 40%-42% to achieve that goal.

If a fairly homogenous society like Scotland imposes such constraint, one wonders how a multiethnic country like ours with all its ?sociological realities and susceptibilities? can do otherwise? It would be a recipe for disaster and social unrest.

However, a tradition is established that, under such circumstances, it is the party that comes first that is called upon to hold discussion with other parties to form a majority government. We could adopt this principle. In effect the leader of the party having obtained more seats will be called by the President to form a government. If he cannot muster enough support, then other leaders would be given such an opportunity.

The predicament worsens in a four-party contest. Allowing this ?preposterous? proposition to go through would mean that a party with only 26% of the national votes would have ?ALL THE POWER ALONE? without sharing with 74% of the people. Unthinkable. The solution is either pre-election alliance or post-election coalition. Not constitutional engineering to make a majority out of a minority.