With the deadline for the completion of Budget Vote Reports set for this Friday (11 July), Committees are in a race to finalise and adopt their reports ahead of the budget vote debates, which are scheduled to start next week.
As a result of the compressed calendar, People’s Assembly has observed the following trends:
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Many committees have not solicited comments from the public or stakeholders. In some cases, committees have either limited or simply done away engaging with the entities owing to the time constraints.
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Many committees have had marathon meetings lasting in to the evenings. Despite this, the feeling is that proceedings are hurried and little time is left to engage meaningfully with the presentations.
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Many of the new MPs are not familiar with the Budget Vote Process let alone with how the departments that they are expected to oversee operate.
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Some departments have received short notice of the meetings and are either not prepared or hand out documents to Members on the same day of their presentations, thus leaving them insufficient time to read and unable to interrogate the documents properly.
People’s Assembly expects this pattern to continue this week and will not be surprised if most committees cite the lack of adequate time as a factor in their reports to the National Assembly.
As far as legislation is concerned, the 2014 Appropriation Bill and Development Bank of Southern Africa Amendment Bill will be presented to MPs this week. Both Bills were introduced in the previous Parliament but automatically lapsed at the end of the Fourth Parliament’s term of office. A motion passed by the Fifth Parliament later revived them.
The main objects of the Development Bank of Southern Africa Amendment Bill is to propose amendments to the Development Bank of Southern Africa Act, 1997, to enable the extension of the operations of the Bank to any national territory on the African continent and its oceanic islands, to increase the authorised share capital of the Bank and enable further increases, to provide for the application of certain legislation to the Bank and to adjust the regulation-making powers.
See the schedule of meetings for this week: http://www.pmg.org.za/schedule
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