While Wednesday’s debate saw opposition leaders Mmusi Maimane and Julius Malema take centre state in the critique of the President’s State of the Nation Address (SONA), Thursday saw the ANC MPs rise to the challenge of defending the President’s speech. Today saw Zuma give a measured response to issues raised ...
Free and fair elections; we shout it and demand it, but in the end, what does it really mean? People’s Assembly attended a round table hosted by The Catholic Parliamentary Liaison Office and the Hans Seidel Foundation, where representatives of the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) and Media Monitoring Africa (MMA) ...
By Mukelani Dimba
On 19 June 2014, 490 Members of Parliament will hear President Jacob Zuma give the State of the Nation Address, which will also mark the opening of the Fifth Parliament. On 21 May 2014, these individuals stood before Chief Justice Mogoeng Mogoeng to swear or affirm their ...
By Raymond Suttner
When we evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of our democracy we need to move beyond criticising our experience of parliamentarism – because political self-realisation can be understood in going beyond the periodic election of representatives.
Indeed the treatment of democracy as equivalent to representative democracy is relatively ...
Wilma Newhoudt-Druchen has experienced many firsts: She was South Africa’s first deaf MP as well as being the first woman and the first person from the African continent to fill the role of Vice President at the World Federation of the Deaf. While she is not returning to Parliament this ...
Gender activists around the country have been stewing this week since the ANC’s announcement of its almost all male selection of premiers as well as the DA’s mostly male cabinet. Whatever the reasons for these selections, these two events have put a spotlight on gender equality in the country. For ...
Parliament’s two Houses, the National Assembly (NA) and National Council of Provinces (NCOP), have just concluded their first sittings – where Members of Parliament were sworn in, and the President was formally elected along with the Speaker of the NA, the Chairperson of the NCOP, and other relevant office bearers. ...
Parliament’s second House, the National Council of Provinces (NCOP), held it’s first sitting today, 22 May, where 54 permanent delegates representing their respective provinces were sworn in. Unlike yesterday’s lengthy and robust first sitting of the National Assembly (NA), the NCOP sitting proved to be more sedate, with the entire ...
Ebrahim Fakir
With South Africa’s 2014 elections done and dusted, it’s an appropriate time to consider serious electoral reform or, at the bare minimum, to introduce a base threshold of support that parties must receive if the pure proportional representation system is to be retained. It is almost intolerable that ...
Today, ahead of the first sitting of Parliament tomorrow, ANC Secretary General, Gwede Mantashe, announced that Max Sisulu will not be returning as Speaker of the National Assembly (NA), and that the nomination for Speaker of the House is party stalwart Baleka Mbete. Lechesa Tsenoli has been named as the ...