<a href="https://absafricatv.com/south-africa-showcases-homegrown-defence-technology/" title="<a href="https://absafricatv.com/south-africa-is-now-set-to-unlock-a-great-new-adventure-tour/" title="South Africa Is Now Set to Unlock a Great New Adventure Tour”>South Africa showcases homegrown defence technology”>South Africa’s court overturns procurement law over public participation
Lev Shevtsov21
September
2026
17:57
In South Africa, the Constitutional Court declared the Public Procurement Act invalid in its entirety because Parliament failed to ensure meaningful public participation in its adoption. This is stated in a Daily Maverick article. The law was intended to replace the fragmented procurement regulatory system with a more coherent one, but following the court’s ruling, the current regime remains in force.
According to the publication’s assessment, Parliament will now have to restart its legislative work, while taxpayers will bear the costs of the court proceedings and the renewed consideration of the document. Public procurement determines how the state spends hundreds of billions of rand, curbs corruption, and creates economic opportunities for South Africans who previously did not have such access.
Warnings during the consideration
On November 17, 2023, Professor Geo Quinot of the African Procurement Law Unit warned the Standing Committee on Finance that there was insufficient time to assess the National Treasury’s responses to public submissions. He called for stakeholders to be given an additional opportunity to respond to these materials.
More current news is available on the UA.News Telegram channel Telegram.
As Daily Maverick notes, the Cosatu trade union federation questioned the integrity of the process, under which, according to available information, about 20% of submissions were considered. AmaBhungane questioned whether the procedure could be regarded as meaningful, while Corruption Watch requested more time. Other participants complained about the late receipt of documents and that they were allotted two minutes each for comments. The National Treasury also acknowledged that, due to a lack of time, it was unable to respond thoroughly to all submissions.
Consideration of the final version
On December 1, 2023, the committee was asked to consider the final version of the bill, which was reportedly submitted only two hours before the meeting. The committee’s content adviser said that the drafting group had been given one hour for work that normally takes eight days.
The publicly available Parliamentary Monitoring Group report does not contain named voting results. It states that the bill and the submission on its desirability were adopted. At the same time, Democratic Alliance representative DT George reserved the party’s position and explicitly objected to the submission. The columnist called on Parliament to introduce named publication of votes, minimum periods for public consultation, and reports on the consideration of submitted proposals.
