Your lack of understanding is mindboggling

Dear Editor,

Re: a Bunch of Hogwash

Wendy, your lack of understanding of simple mathematics is truly mindboggling!

You keep quoting this instance of 5 H.R.P.P candidates running as a significant factor in the return of the government. This is faulty logic and, if anything, the example disproves your theory.

Samoa’s election system is based on the simple majority rule and whoever gets the most votes in the election wins.

Let me demonstrate the fallacy of your logic by this simple example. Assume that there are 100 voters in the constituency and there are 5 HRPP candidates and one Tautua candidate. 

If 51 people vote for the H.R.P.P and 49 people vote for the Tautua party, then the result is a likely win for the Tautua. Let me explain. 

H.R.P.P candidate 1 has 41 votes on the assumption that the other 4 H.R.P.P candidates have 8 votes in total (assuming that the candidate and his/her seconder vote for the candidate and there are no other votes). 

This is an extreme scenario but it goes to show the dilution of the H.R.P.P vote by running 5 candidates.

The H.R.P.P candidate winning in this constituency despite the competition from 4 other candidates only indicates the strength of this local candidate in garnering the required votes to win.

Many other writers have written about the quirks and strengths of our electoral system and I don’t intend to add to it. 

What I do want to point out is that our electoral system is different to others practiced in countries like Australia with its preferential system. 

Only under a preferential electoral system would your argument and logic apply. 

The other four H.R.P.P candidates would have given their preferences to their candidate and in my example above the HRPP candidate would have 51 votes and win the election. Please Wendy use some other example to support your arguments.

 

Vai Autu

Samoa Observer

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