Parliament’s 2005 was an “annus horribilis”, with MPs embroiled in the Travelgate scandal and the leader of government business and Jacob Zuma, forced to resign under a cloud of corruption. This year promises to be as trying.

MPs will return to Cape Town for the state of the nation address by President Thabo Mbeki on February 3, with 21 of their number still facing criminal charges for allegedly defrauding Parliament of millions in the Travelgate scandal. Eight have lost their seats after entering into plea-bargain agreements with the National Prosecuting Authority. They have had to pay substantial fines.

Hard on the heels of Mbeki’s address comes the annual budget from Finance Minister Trevor Manuel on February 15.

Immediately thereafter, a two-week “constituency period” has been scheduled so that MPs can return to their designated areas to campaign in local government elections. This will put pressure on both houses when Parliament convenes in March as they begin to process the budget votes of individual departments.

For the past two years Parliament has been accused of devaluing the budget votes and debates of the departments by dealing with them in extended public committees and on some days handling as many as three at a time.

Extended public committees are formed by dividing the National Assembly into four committees of about 100 MPs each. The committees then debate the budget votes and the National Assembly then votes on them.

Having more than one budget vote on any given day means that neither MPs nor the media are able to give them the attention they deserve. Ironically this comes at a time when Parliament’s declared intention is to beef up its oversight of departments and the executive.

On the legislation front, some difficult times also lie ahead. One is the Prohibition of Mercenary Activities and Prohibition of Certain Activities in an Area of Conflict Bill, which will come before the defence committee.

The bill has attracted interest from the diplomatic community as a result of the provisions that could make it illegal for foreigners who have served in these conflict areas to visit SA.

Also likely to attract controversy will be bills applying to the judiciary. These include a constitutional amendment formalising the Constitutional Court’s role as the country’s top court and the granting of administrative authority over the courts to the justice minister. The latter caused a furore last year when it was claimed that it undermined the independence of the judiciary.

The justice committee will also be expecting the Child Justice Bill and the Sexual Offences Bill to, at long last, return to Parliament. Both were half-way through the parliamentary process shortly before the April 2004 election but have yet to re-appear. Activists and child protection nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) bemoan the delays in bringing these new laws to finality.

With Parliament’s declared intention to improve oversight of executive and service delivery, its parallel, the African Peer Review Mechanism, will be of critical importance. SA is currently under review by the panel.

While NGOs are involved in the process, many are concerned about the independence of those selected, particularly after Mbeki used the launch of the review to question the independence of organisations funded from abroad. “Do they reflect us, the ordinary people they should be representing, or do they represent other interests?”

Against this background National Assembly speaker Baleka Mbete launched a separate review that she said would feed into the national process.

She insisted that Parliament’s report on how well, or how poorly, SA has been doing would go to Public Service Minister Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi once completed, but would not be changed in any way. There will be considerable interest in whether the national legislature adopts positions on issues that are critical of the executive.

Critics say that because the proportional representation system centralises power in the hands of the party bosses, ordinary MPs are reluctant to be too critical of the cabinet lest they find themselves left off electoral lists in the next election.

The peer review process provides Parliament an opportunity to illustrate its independence from the executive, despite the fact that both entities are dominated by the ruling African National Congress.

With acknowledgements to Wyndham Hartley and the Business Day.