The arms debacle in Parliament's crucial Standing Committee on Public Accounts last year brought the whole issue of the separation of powers into sharp focus.

The problem was that perceptions were created that the committee's African National Congress (ANC) members acted in a certain way to protect members of the cabinet. For example, the committee voted unanimously in late 2000 to include the Heath special investigating unit in the arms deal probe.

But when cabinet ministers objected to Heath's inclusion, the ANC component in the committee did an about-face and denied ever having supported his inclusion.

It was absolutely clear to all that political pressure had caused the ANC to change its position.

What was sacrificed was the principle of the separation of powers, which allows the national legislature to monitor the way in the which the executive branch spends public money.

This separation of powers is being further eroded in other areas but, before we look at them, it is worth seeing what the constitution says on the matter. The powers of the National Assembly include "the power to consider, pass, amend or reject legislation. The National Assembly must provide mechanisms to ensure that all executive organs of state in the national sphere of government are accountable to it and to maintain oversight of the national executive authority including the implementation of legislation."

With reference to the president and the national executive, the constitution says: "The executive authority of the republic is vested in the president."

The president, it says, exercises the executive authority together with other members of the cabinet by "implementing national legislation except where the constitution or an act of Parliament provides otherwise."

It further provides that the members of cabinet are accountable "collectively and individually to Parliament for the exercise of their powers and the performance of their functions".

Given that the constitution says this, how is it that legislation is not implemented once it has been approved by Parliament?

Consider the now infamous section 49 of the Criminal Procedure Act, which defines the circumstances under which lethal force may be used in effecting an arrest, and when a fleeing suspect may be shot.

This apartheid-era law, which allows lethal force to be used if the crime committed falls into a particular category, is still on the statute book. This in spite of the fact that the justice minister, through the justice committee and Parliament, approved a new section 49 some four years ago. This revised 49 substantially alters the way in which lethal force may be applied by both police and private citizens.

It is common knowledge that two generations of national police commissioners and their ministers of safety and security do not approve of the new law.

The fact remains that Parliament has approved the law, and the executive has a constitutional duty to implement it.

But four years down the track, the new section 49 gathers dust. The constitution is silent on how long the executive can take to implement a law. State legal advisers, who declined to be named, say that this means a "reasonable amount of time". They also agree that four years to implement a new law is clearly unreasonable.

Any court of law would rule against the state if an application was brought to force the implementation of section 49, they say.

Section 49 is not the only one. Large chunks of the Access to Information Act, the Equality Act, and the Access to Administrative Justice Act, took years to implement.

Indeed, the Maintenance Act, which aims to protect women who are paid money for the maintenance of their children, is still not a going concern after four years because the functions of maintenance investigators are still being defined.

Of course, this raises the question of why the executive brings legislation to Parliament that it cannot implement, and which it knows it cannot implement.

Two issues are at stake here. The executive is paying little more than lip service to the separation of powers. If it was taking the matter seriously, laws approved by Parliament would be implemented.

In most democracies the refusal by the executive to do the bidding of the national legislature would trigger a constitutional crisis. Here we simply go about our business as if that is the way it was intended.

What we really need is for some brave soul to challenge the government for failing to observe the decisions of Parliament. Members of Parliament are elected representatives of the people, and by ignoring Parliament the president and his cabinet are ignoring the people who voted them into power.

Enough is enough.

Hartley is Parliamentary Editor.