Independent candidates interested in running for provincial and national elections in South Africa might have to wait a little while longer, as a timeline set to amend the country’s Electoral Act has been put on hold to address constitutional amendments that might make it a possibility.
The country’s Home Affairs Minister Aaron Motsoaledi made this known while addressing Members of Parliament (MPs) on Tuesday. In his statement, Motsoaledi revealed that no such legislative change would be possible without a constitutional amendment.
Recall that in June this year, South Africa’s Constitutional Court declared the Electoral Act to be unconstitutional. After the New Nation Movement (NNM) launched a bid to allow independent candidates to run for elections, challenging the current Electoral Act 73 of 1998. The movement argued that the act infringed on the right to exercise individual politics.
Following this, the court ordered Parliament to amend the Electoral Act in 24 months. To which the parliamentary home affairs committee presented a timeline on amending the Electoral Act, “Electoral Act Amendment Integrated Road Map Time Planner”, that showed how Parliament, the home affairs Minister and the Electoral Commission of South Africa (IEC) would meet up with the June 2022 deadline.
More Pressing Issues
The original roadmap gave Home Affairs to mid-September or mid-October 2020 to finalize an electoral system policy review, draft the bill, and process it through Cabinet before tabling it in Parliament in December 2020. MPs would get to it in early February 2021.
But Motsoaledi revealed that drafting out the new policy would take longer as he was focused on finalizing a range of other electoral amendments needed to be in place ahead of the next local government elections that statutorily must happen between 4 August 2021 and 1 November 2021.
“Remember, it is the executive [that] must come with a policy [on the basis of which law is made]. That is the draft we are still working on…”
The Home Affairs Minister did not indicate when the electoral system policy process would be complete.
