This article provides an overview of South Africa's electoral arrangements. It consists of three sections. The first sketches the historical background of the present system and some of the important events that led to the adoption of the interim constitution and the election of 27 April 1994. The second section highlights the salient features of the electoral system and briefly comments on the results that it yielded in the April 1994 election. The section also points out the weak and strong points of the system. The third section is prescriptive in nature. It argues how the present arrangements could be improved in terms of constitutional principles that govern the drafting of the `final' constitution, and the recently adopted guidelines of the African National Congress on this matter.
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