Kirsten Hund interviewt Caron Kgomo, lid van de grootste regerende partij, het ANC. Judith Sargentini, lid van oppositiepartij Groen Links reageert daarop in een brief.
Caron Kgomo
Caron is Councilor for the Inner city section 79 (Joburg). She is 39 years old, also has a full time job with the department of Housing, within the anti-corruption unit, and she has 5 children.
This will be her second time to run. Caron has been a councilor since ’99. She got into politics because of her involvement in community work. On behalf of her community, she negotiated development initiatiaves with the government representatives. As an ANC member, she was invited to run for councilllor.
Why is she running for a second time this year? “ Politics is complicated.You need a few years of experience in the field to understand how politics really work. So I will be more effective as a councilor in my second term”.
Judith Sargentini
I’m 31 years old and I joined the Amsterdam city council in 1999 (similar to you) one year after the elections of 1998 as a ‘civic member.’ That is a position for a member of the party to learn on the job. I could speak for my party in the various council committees but not in the plenary, of course. In 2002 I officially got elected as 6th member of the Greens. We have a 4 years term and now I’m up for re-election. I made my way up to the second place of the party list. The first woman on the list, which automatically leads to more preference votes by women voting for women. (We should do that, I think, because we are still under represented in most parliaments)
Caron Kgomo in Johannesburg
Judith Sargentini in Amsterdam
Introductie
