South Africa’s Deputy President Shipokosa Paul Mashatile has welcomed the finalisation of several key bills by the National Assembly during the first quarter of 2024, in his capacity as Leader of Government Business in Parliament.
In a statement released today, the Deputy President commended Parliament for making headway on critical legislative pieces aimed at bolstering governance, service delivery and economic development.
Among the bills given the green light are the Public Administration Management Amendment Bill, Public Service Amendment Bill, Statistics Amendment Bill, General Intelligence Laws Amendment Bill, and the Electoral Matters Amendment Bill.
“We welcome this significant progress in the enactment of key legislation that will move our country forward in fulfilling the mandate of the 6th democratic administration,” Mashatile stated.
The significance of the legislative programme is that it is a linear and revolving responsibility to both enact legislation and fine-tune existing laws.
“We are confident that at the end of this term, all priority legislation will have gone through the rigorous parliamentary process, passed the constitutional master and become laws of the Republic, after the President has assented to the Bills.
According to official statement by the Union Buildings, the public service Bills have now been referred to the National Council of Provinces (NCOP) for consideration.
As Section 75 (of the Constitution) Bills, the other Bills have been referred to specific parliamentary portfolio committees for processing. It bears reminding that the Constitution distinguishes between four categories of Bills, these being:
• section 74 Bills — Bills amending the Constitution;
• section 75 Bills — ordinary Bills not affecting the provinces;
• section 76 Bills — ordinary Bills affecting the provinces; and
• section 77 Bills — money Bills (that is Bills that deal with appropriations, taxes, levies or duties).
