Kreetika Kumar 
Political sociologist Prof. Steven Ratuva
If the threshold for the allocation of seats in parliament is lowered from five percent to two or three percent, Fiji is likely to see more political party coalitions in the future.
Political sociologist Steven Ratuva highlighted this as the review of the electoral legislation is underway.
Professor Ratuva says the threshold will also make a lot of difference in terms of the number of political parties.
Currently, there are a total of 14 proposed political parties for the next election.
Professor Ratuva says for a small country like Fiji, with a limited voting population, a five percent threshold is considered relatively high by global standards.
“Many larger countries have an electoral threshold of around three percent. For a small country like Fiji, with a limited voting population, a five percent threshold is actually seen globally as being pretty high.”
Professor Ratuva says that a lower threshold would enable smaller parties to gain representation, reshaping the governance structure.
Electoral Law Reform Review Team Chair Daniel Fatiaki says the reduction will give an equal fighting opportunity to small parties and independent candidates to get into parliament.
The electoral thresholds determine the minimum percentage of votes a party must secure to gain seats in Parliament.
In many democracies, it is believed that higher thresholds tend to favor larger, more established parties.
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