The South African Legislative Sector’s (SAL) Secretaries Forum, an advisory arm of the Speakers Forum, this week held a workshop to deliberate on draft regulations of some of the key legislation in the sector, as a process is currently underway to revise regulations to the Financial Management of Parliament and Provincial Legislatures Act (FMPPLA), the Supply Chain Management (SCM) Act and the Political Party Funding Act.
The leadership of the provincial legislatures and national Parliament met in Gauteng this week to deliberate on the final draft of the regulations before publishing them for public comments.
The meeting was opened by the Chairperson of the Forum of Secretaries and Secretary to Parliament, Mr Xolile George, who thanked the drafters and advisors who contributed to the process of developing the regulations.
Explaining the process, the Convener of the Core Business Cluster in the Secretaries Forum and Secretary to the NCOP, Advocate Phindela, then said the three sets of regulations will follow different processes before they are finalised and sent to the executive authority (Speakers Forum) for adoption. “This process started some time ago and it is now coming into fruition. The draft regulations [on the three acts] were sent to the provincial legislatures for comments and briefing the speakers, then came back to the Secretaries Forum to refine the drafting. Today was the final stage of ensuring that the draft regulations are presented.
“These three sets of regulations will follow different processes. The SCM and Political Party funding regulations will be published for public comment before they are finalised, once executive authority is satisfied that the regulations meet the requirements of the acts, while the general regulations for FMPPLA will not invite public comments, the executive authority will have to confirm if they meet the requirements of the legislation before adoption,” Adv Phindela explained.
He called on all South Africans to comment on the draft regulations when they are published. “All members of the public are encouraged to make comments. It would be interesting to also get inputs of ordinary citizens and not only organised structures,” he said. He also thanked the legal advisor’s forum, the CFO forum and the entire support team at SALS for ensuring that the process went smoothly. “The regulations may not be perfect, but we must start somewhere. There might be some things that are not included and the time will come for that,” he said.
The FMPPLA governs the budgeting and financial management processes of national Parliament and the provincial legislatures, while the Political Party Funding Act is a law that regulates public and private funding of political parties, including the disclosure of donations. The SCM regulations provide guidelines and ensure adherence to all legislation governing the supply chain management process and prevent abuse of the process in Parliament and the provincial legislatures.
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