The Electoral Commission invited all interested stakeholders to attend public hearings into the draft regulations for the Political Party Funding Act (Act 6 of 2018) in Cape Town on 1–2 August 2019.
The hearings were held at the Taj Hotel on Whale Street. A provisional programme for the hearings can be found below.
The hearings follow the publication of draft regulations for comment between 1 and 21 March 2019 during which approximately 4 300 written submissions were received.
The Political Party Funding Act regulates the public and private funding of political parties, in particular:
- providing for the establishment and management of Represented Political Parties’ Fund and a new Multiparty Democracy Fund;
- to prohibit certain donations made directly to political parties;
- to regulate disclosure of donations accepted;
- to determine the duties of political parties in respect of funding;
- to provide for powers and duties of the Commission;
- to provide for administrative fines;
- to repeal the Public Funding of Represented Political Parties Act, 1997; and
- to provide for transitional matters.
The Draft Political Party Funding Regulations 2019, read in conjunction with Schedule 2 of the Act, are intended to give effect to these provisions and cover all chapters of the Act except Chapter 5 which deals with enforcement and which is intended for implementation in a later phase.
In April 2019 the Commission postponed the implementation of the first phase to allow time to process the large number of written submissions and to allow further opportunity for engagement through public hearings.
The postponement also took into consideration the capacity demands on the Electoral Commission, political parties and other stakeholders during the National and Provincial Elections 2019.
For more information on the Political Party Funding Act kindly contact Boitumelo Ranyane via email mailto:[email protected] or on 012 622 5209.
For media enquiries kindly contact Kate Bapela on 082 600 6386 or email [email protected]