Bill Watch 47/2019
Supplementary Budget Acts gazetted & MOPO Bill delayed
22 August 2019
BILL WATCH 47/2019
[26th August 2019]
Both Houses of Parliament Will Resume Sitting on Tuesday 27th August
The Senate’s Special Sitting on 14th August
Recalled from their recess by the President to conduct special business [see
Bill Watch 45/2019 of 12th August [link] – Senators assembled on Wednesday
14th August for a single sitting that lasted for just over eight hours, with the
adjournment until Tuesday 27th August coming at 10.37 pm. The special
business specified by the President was passing the Appropriation
Supplementary (2019) Bill, the Finance (No. 2) Bill and the Maintenance of
Peace and Order Bill.
Fast-tracking
Senators began by approving a Government motion to fast-track all three Bills
by suspending all Standing Orders that might otherwise prevent them from
taking all stages of the Bills the same day. Asked by the President of the
Senate to give reasons for the motion, the Minister of Justice, Legal and
Parliamentary Affairs briefly referred to the fact that the Second Session of the
present Parliament would be starting in September, that the Government
wished Parliament to complete the Bills before the end of the current Session
and that the Maintenance of Peace and Order Bill, part of the Government’s
“legislative reform agenda which had been outstanding for a long time”, had
already been subjected to a long delay by the Parliamentary Legal Committee
[PLC]. He did not, however, mention the special need for the Finance (No. 2)
Bill to be gazetted as law on or before 21st August – which we explained in Bill
Watch 45/2019 [link]; as things turned out, this deadline was met [see below
under Acts gazetted].
Maintenance of Peace and Order Bill
The Senate first tackled the Maintenance of Peace and Order Bill. The Minister
of Justice, Legal and Parliamentary Affairs piloted the Bill through the Senate
instead of the Minister of Home Affairs and Cultural Heritage, who is the
responsible Minister. In his speech commencing the Second Reading stage
the Minister explained to Senators the changes that had been made to the Bill
by the National Assembly [link] before it reached the Senate. Discussion of
the Bill took until after 9 pm, with a fifteen-minute “re-energisation break” just
after 8 pm. Opposition Senators bombarded the Minister with criticisms of the
Bill and suggestions for improvements. The Minister, however, made only one
concession – he accepted an amendment to clause 7(5), which will now read
as follows:
‘Any person who knowingly fails to give notice of a gathering in terms of
subsection (1) or of the postponement or delay of a gathering in terms of