Government’s plan against hunger, if approved, may cost the already cash-strapped country more than R86 billion over the next five years. These figures presented in parliament this week had a few MPs in the Portfolio Committee on Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries at the edge of their seats questioning where the money will come from.
How well is the People’s Parliament living up to this name? Community members who monitor parliament as part of the Parliament Watch collective give their impressions of various portfolio committee meetings and how MPs are exercising their oversight duty. By making Parliament everyone’s business, public agency, transparency, and access to information – all important building blocks of democracy – is promoted. Parliament Watch monitors affiliated to the Social Justice Coalition Lunga Mtoto, Nosipho Zembe and Yonela Maweza attended the Portfolio Committee on Police on Tuesday, 14 November 2017. This is their impressions
Despite alarming figures of tens of thousands of child marriages in the country, much-needed legislation to address the issue is seemingly still a long way off for those considered child victims of forced marriages.
The South African Local Government Association (SALGA), in partnership with the University of the Western Cape’s Dullah Omar Institute, will host a research colloquium in Cape Town on 28 – 29 March 2018. The theme of the colloquium is “Rethinking Local Government Transformation: Spatial Planning, Robust Governance and Sustainable Financing as tools for developmental local government”
The Socio-economic Rights Project at the Dullah Omar Institute, University of the Western Cape (UWC) has a bursary available for a full-time student to study in 2018 towards a Master’s Degree in Law with a specific focus on Human Rights and Food Security.
A regional conference held in Malawi, the birthplace of paralegalism, called upon states to recognise and support the key role played by paralegals in the criminal justice system. The conference proceedings were facilitated by ACJR researcher Jean Redpath.
Dr Conrad Bosire has rejoined the Dullah Omar Institute as a post-doctoral fellow under the SARChI chair. The aim of the fellowship is to update his PhD thesis and research into a publication.
The Dullah Omar Institute’s Women and Democracy Initiative, in collaboration with the Parliament Watch collective has recently published the first edition of its bi-weekly newsletter, ParlyBeat.
Local government practitioners can't deliver well because they lack credible constitutional powers to help them deliver services. These are words by Prof Jaap de Visser, the director of the Dullah Omar Institute when giving keynote speech at the 4th Annual National Conference on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights at Makerere University in Uganda.
Navigating Parliament and access to information can at times be difficult for ordinary citizens. The past week was no exception for members of the Parliament Watch (ParlyWatch) collective who monitors these parliamentary meetings. Although the blockages are not official, the systems and ways of getting access to information and committees are becoming more and more hidden, changeable and closed,writes Sam Waterhouse
On 3 November, the Dullah Omar Institute hosted the President of Open Society Foundation, Chris Stone and OSF-SA CEO Fatima Hassan.
Nobody wants to become a crime statistic yet the crime figures released recently show the probability of this happening to the average South African remains high. Despite crime affecting all citizens across communities, their experiences may vary depending on certain factors.
