People Power As A Healthy Political Force
Shyamon Jayasinghe
“If people power provides no panacea, it does in many instances open up alternatives to war and armed struggle.’ – April Carter “People Power and Protest since 1945”
The recent Australian Federal Elections threw into sharp relief a dramatic instance of the play of people power operative within a democratic system. It was an organized and effective assertion of community action against the prevailing duopolistic stranglehold by the two mainstream parties.
This illustration came from the Northern Victorian electorate called Indi. In the vast Australian landscape where political power is being monopolized by two main parties forming government in a game of musical chairs, here in Indi we saw how an independent grass roots movement spontaneously formed during the election campaign worked to bring down the influential Liberal Party front bencher, Sophia Mirabella, who held the seat for 12 years while simultaneously disregarding any challenge by the Labour Party. The independent movement became known as “The Voice of Indi,” as if to suggest that neither of the mainstream parties represented the aspirations of the electorate. Its candidate, Cathy McGovern, triumphed in a campaign that was on the wire right to the end. People power registered a victory to the surprised dismay of the main players who had taken the electorate for granted and stopped listening to it.
This particular electoral drama sent shock waves through the two-party dominated political system. For too long the political players under this two-party system had demarcated the country into a list of ‘safe seats’ and’ marginal seats.’ A goodly part of the whole electorate had safe seats for either Labour or Liberal. The seat I live in is claimed to be ‘Labor- safe’ and I’ve never seen the MP who just complacently walks under his party umbrella.
MS McGowan told ABC Radio Statewide Drive Victoria that she holds her victory with enormous pride.
“A very tightly fought victory, right down to the wire, we’ve run a grassroots campaign and people have really responded and you walk up the street and people tooting their horns and congratulations and well done and it’s amazing to think about what 33 000 votes looks like but you hear it, it’s wonderful.”
