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ActionSA has today announced our intention to introduce the Lobbying Transparency Bill, a Private Member's Bill to establish South Africa's first comprehensive statutory framework regulating professional lobbying and promoting transparency in political and executive decision-making.

This is the second bill in our Transparency Package of Bills, aimed at creating greater ethics and transparency in our democratic and governance frameworks. The first of these bills was our Election Integrity Bill, which was introduced in parliament in November last year. 

South Africa has long suffered the consequences of opaque influence over public decision-making. From the Arms Deal and the era of State Capture to the Digital Vibes scandal and, most recently, allegations involving Resolve Communications, successive controversies have exposed how politically connected individuals and private interests can gain privileged access to government with little transparency or public accountability.

Despite these repeated scandals, there are no legal requirements compelling professional lobbyists to disclose who they represent, which public officials they engage, what matters they seek to influence, or what safeguards exist to protect the integrity of public decision-making.

This Bill will not restrict the constitutional rights of South Africans to engage government, petition public institutions or participate in democratic processes. Instead, it will ensure that professional lobbying conducted on behalf of paying clients is transparent, accountable and subject to appropriate public scrutiny.

The proposed Lobbying Transparency Bill will therefore establish a modern regulatory framework founded on four core principles:

A mandatory public register of professional lobbyists, requiring any person or entity lobbying government on behalf of paying clients to disclose who they represent and the public institutions they seek to influence.

Transparency around engagements with public office-bearers, including appropriate disclosure of lobbying meetings with members of the Executive, MPs and other designated public officials.

Cooling-off restrictions preventing former Ministers, Deputy Ministers and senior public officials from immediately lobbying the institutions they recently served.

Independent oversight and enforcement, including meaningful reporting obligations and sanctions for non-compliance to ensure that transparency requirements are effective in practice.

Details of the proposed legislation can be found on our website, and we invite all interested parties to submit comments and proposals to parliament@actionsa.org.za as the drafting process progresses.

While the GNU continues to fail in delivering any meaningful governance reform, ActionSA, as the country's constructive opposition, has already introduced six Private Members' Bills during the first two years of the Seventh Parliament and will gazette its seventh Bill next week.

The Lobbying Transparency Bill represents the next step in ActionSA's legislative agenda: strengthening transparency, restoring public confidence in democratic institutions and ensuring that influence over government is exercised in the open, not behind closed doors.

Issued by ActionSA Parliamentary Chief Whip Lerato Ngobeni