Forum focuses on Accountability of the Parliament Administration
Son of late Mr Lennox Garane speaking at the Forum on Accountability of the Parliament Administration.

Forum focuses on Accountability of the Parliament Administration

The Dullah Omar Institute's Women and Democracy Initiative, Institute for Justice and Reconciliation and Public Service Accountability Monitor convened a Forum on Accountability of the Parliament Administration [FAPA] for civil society and the media on 22 January in Cape Town. The forum was to develop a civil society approach to Parliament Administration Accountability.

FAPA was initiated by former managers of the Parliamentary Administration, with civil society support, to draw attention to the systemic collapse in governance within the 5th Democratic Parliament. The urgent need to do so was highlighted by the first protest suicide in South Africa, the tragic demise of Mr Lennox Garane. FAPA arose to provide a network of support for the Garane Family in revealing the truth about what drove Mr Garane to such a desperate course of action, and to ensure appropriate consequences for those implicated. FAPA also support the broader public interest issues around the accountability of Parliament’s administration, which Mr Garane stood – and indeed – died for.

FAPA is an advocacy campaign with two phases. Phase 1 is an intense 3-month advocacy campaign coinciding with the final months of the 5th Democratic Parliament, culminating in a Citizens’ Legacy Report for the 5th Parliament. Phase 2 uses the Citizens’ Report as a benchmark against which to measure the extent to which the incoming 6th Parliament addresses the challenges and opportunities raised in the Citizen’s Legacy Report.

The forum included representatives from civil society organisations and the media who shared Mr Garane’s experience and provided public policy experts and social justice activists in the field of accountability the Constitution and oversight with a platform to comment on the serious challenges facing the Parliamentary Administration in the wake of Lennox Garane’s death by Protest Suicide, and its impact on the country’s state of governance.