Composition and Duties of South Africa’s Parliament

South Africa’s journey from apartheid to a constitutional democracy produced one of the most carefully designed legislatures on the African continent. At the heart of this transformation sits a bicameral Parliament that not only makes laws but also holds the executive in check, gives provinces a direct voice in national affairs, and actively invites ordinary citizens into the process of governance. Understanding how this Parliament is put together and what it actually does offers a window into how post-1994 South Africa balances representation, accountability, and cooperative government.

The constitutional foundation of Parliament 🔗

Parliament is established under Chapter 4 of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 1996, which lays out its composition, powers, and functions. According to the South African Government, Parliament is the legislative authority of the country and has the power to make laws for the country, in accordance with the Constitution . Its mandate is further shaped by the Powers, Privileges and Immunities of Parliament and Provincial Legislatures Act of 2004, and the Money Bills Amendment Procedure and Related Matters Act of 2009.

What makes this framework distinctive is its explicit commitment to democratic values. Parliament is required to promote human dignity, equality, non-racialism, non-sexism, and the rights enshrined in the Bill of Rights. Every function it performs, from drafting statutes to questioning ministers, flows from these foundational principles.

A bicameral structure: two Houses, two roles 🔗

Parliament consists of two Houses that work in parallel but perform distinct functions: the National Assembly (NA), which serves as the lower house, and the National Council of Provinces (NCOP), which serves as the upper house. Both chambers traditionally sit in the Houses of Parliament in Cape Town, although a devastating fire in January 2022 caused significant damage and forced temporary relocations while rebuilding work continues.

The National Assembly 🔗

The National Assembly is the larger and more prominent chamber. As explained by People’s Assembly, the National Assembly must have a maximum of 400 Members and a minimum of 350 Members of Parliament . Members are elected through a proportional representation system, which means parties receive seats in proportion to the votes they win. Half of the seats are filled from nine provincial party lists and the other half from national lists, ensuring both regional and national representation.

Each Parliament serves a five-year term, with the twenty-eighth Parliament first convening on 14 June 2024 following the May 2024 general elections. The Assembly is presided over by a Speaker and Deputy Speaker, elected by the members from among themselves. The Speaker manages debates, enforces rules, and represents the Assembly in official matters.

One of the National Assembly’s most consequential powers is the election of the President of the Republic. It also passes most national legislation, approves the national budget, and scrutinises the work of government departments. Because it is directly linked to the popular vote, its political composition typically mirrors the broader electoral preferences of the country.

The National Council of Provinces 🔗

The NCOP was created in 1997 to replace the earlier Senate and to give provinces a stronger structural voice in national lawmaking. According to the Parliament of South Africa, the NCOP consists of 90 provincial delegates, ie 10 delegates for each of the nine provinces . Equal representation, regardless of provincial population, is a deliberate design choice meant to protect smaller provinces from being overshadowed.

Each provincial delegation is made up of six permanent delegates and four special delegates. The permanent delegates are appointed by the provincial legislatures, while the special delegates include the Premier of the province and three other members of the provincial legislature, rotated depending on the subject under discussion. The South African Local Government Association (SALGA) also has ten delegates who participate in debates but do not vote.

The NCOP is led by a Chairperson, whose election is presided over by the Chief Justice. The chamber also elects a permanent Deputy Chairperson and a second Deputy Chairperson whose one-year term rotates among the provinces. This rotation reinforces the principle of provincial parity that sits at the heart of the NCOP’s design.

Core duties and functions 🔗

Parliament’s responsibilities extend well beyond passing laws. Its mandate, as described by the Parliament of South Africa, involves four interlinked tasks: making laws, overseeing the executive, facilitating public participation, and engaging in international relations and cooperative governance.

Passing and amending legislation 🔗

Lawmaking is the most visible function of Parliament. The Constitution divides Bills into four categories: constitutional amendments (section 74), Bills not affecting provinces (section 75), Bills affecting provinces (section 76), and money Bills (section 77). Each category follows a different procedure depending on which House holds primary authority. The NA generally drives Bills that do not directly affect provincial competence, while the NCOP takes a leading role on Bills that touch on provincial interests.

Parliament also has the exclusive power to amend the Constitution itself, subject to strict procedural safeguards. Amendments to the founding provisions require a 75 percent majority in the National Assembly, while most other constitutional changes require a two-thirds majority. This ensures that the country’s supreme law cannot be altered on the basis of narrow political majorities.

Overseeing the executive 🔗

Holding the government accountable is perhaps Parliament’s most critical democratic function. The Parliament of South Africa notes that the National Assembly performs this role by ensuring that all executive organs of state at the national level of government are answerable to it, and maintaining oversight over the exercise of national government authority, and the implementation of legislation .

This oversight is exercised through multiple mechanisms. Portfolio Committees in the National Assembly shadow each national government department, while Select Committees in the NCOP cover clusters of departments. Parliament’s Oversight and Accountability Model further provides for budget vote debates, questions for executive reply, members’ statements, notices of motion, debates on matters of public importance, and constituency work. A Joint Parliamentary Oversight and Governance Assurance Committee tracks commitments made by ministers on the floor of the Houses and monitors follow-through.

The Constitution empowers committees to summon witnesses, compel the production of documents, and conduct inquiries into any matter of public concern. One of the most important aspects of the oversight function is the scrutiny of annual departmental reports and reports from the Auditor-General, which act as the financial and performance conscience of government.

Facilitating public participation 🔗

Public participation is not an optional extra in South Africa-it is a constitutional requirement. Sections 59 and 72 of the Constitution require the National Assembly and the NCOP to facilitate public involvement in their legislative and other processes, and to conduct their business in an open manner. Parliamentary sittings are open to the public, and the institution maintains structured mechanisms for citizens to submit written comments on Bills, attend committee hearings, and petition their representatives.

Specific programmes bring Parliament closer to the people. These include the People’s Assembly, the NCOP’s Taking Parliament to the People initiative, sectoral parliaments for youth and women, Provincial Week engagements, and oversight visits by committees. As researchers at the Institute for Security Studies have argued, public participation is imperative in facilitating Parliament’s role of oversight within the Executive – it allows citizens to put to practise their Constitutional right in holding government departments and parastatals accountable for their actions .

In practice, however, meaningful participation remains uneven. Analysts at the Democracy Development Program highlight that many South Africans remain unaware of parliamentary activities or feel excluded from committee work, which limits community-informed oversight and erodes public trust.

International relations and cooperative governance 🔗

Parliament is also an actor on the global stage. It participates in international parliamentary bodies such as the Pan-African Parliament, the Inter-Parliamentary Union, the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, the SADC Parliamentary Forum, and the African, Caribbean and Pacific-European Union Forum. These engagements allow South African legislators to shape regional and global responses to issues like human rights, climate change, trade, and sustainable development.

At home, the NCOP plays a unique role in cooperative governance. It is constitutionally tasked with ensuring that the three spheres of government-national, provincial, and local-work together without encroaching on each other’s areas of competence. This is particularly important in matters of concurrent legislative competence, such as health, education, and housing, where coordinated action is essential for effective service delivery.

Committees: where the real work happens 🔗

Much of Parliament’s substantive work is done in committees rather than on the floor of the House. Portfolio Committees in the NA and Select Committees in the NCOP scrutinise Bills line by line, interrogate departmental budgets, and question senior officials. Joint committees, such as the Constitutional Review Committee and the Joint Standing Committee on Defence, bring the two Houses together on matters of shared concern. Ad hoc committees are created for specific temporary tasks and dissolved once the task is complete.

Internal committees-such as the Rules Committee, Programme Committee, and Disciplinary Committee-handle the administrative life of Parliament itself, from managing budgets and schedules to regulating the conduct of members.

Challenges and the road ahead 🔗

Despite its sophisticated architecture, South Africa’s Parliament faces real challenges. Research published in the Potchefstroom Electronic Law Journal notes that in the first decade of South Africa’s democracy, parliament mostly focussed on ensuring the transformation of the country’s legislative landscape in line with the Constitution , with oversight receiving comparatively less attention. Executive non-compliance with committee recommendations, uneven capacity across committees, and limited public awareness continue to shape debates about institutional reform. The physical rebuild of the Houses of Parliament after the 2022 fire has added a literal reconstruction project to the figurative one of strengthening democratic accountability.

What do you think? Does equal provincial representation in the NCOP strengthen cooperative governance, or does it risk giving smaller provinces disproportionate influence over national policy? And how might Parliament make public participation more meaningful rather than purely procedural?

References

1. https://www.gov.za/about-government/government-system/national-legislature-parliament
2. https://www.pa.org.za/info/national-assembly
3. https://www.parliament.gov.za/national-council-provinces
4. https://www.parliament.gov.za/what-parliament-does
5. https://www.parliament.gov.za/oversight
6. https://issafrica.org/iss-today/challenges-to-public-participation-in-south-africas-parliament
7. https://ddp.org.za/blog/the-role-of-parliamentary-oversight-in-promoting-better-service-delivery-in-south-africa
8. https://scielo.org.za/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1727-37812023000100013