LOCAL GOVERNMENT: COALITION BILL HEADS TO PARLIAMENT

LOCAL GOVERNMENT: COALITION BILL HEADS TO PARLIAMENT

• 07 August 2026
• Local & Provincial Government
• SA Legal Academy

Please note: Parliamentary papers have confirmed that the Bill was tabled on 18 August 2026.

In anticipation of tabling legislation in Parliament intended to ensure smoother, more effective governance under coalition councils, the Department of Co-operative Governance & Traditional Affairs has gazetted an explanatory summary of the latest Local Government: Municipal Structures Amendment Bill.

Approved by Cabinet at its 29 July 2026 meeting, according to a media statement issued at the time the Bill ‘seeks to provide a clear legislative framework for the formation of coalition governments (at municipal level) and to establish mechanisms to minimise … related challenges’. In that regard, the statement referred expressly to provisions intended to:

• ‘promote stable and accountable coalition governance’
• ‘reduce political instability’, and
• ‘support the uninterrupted delivery of services to communities’.

Against that backdrop, the explanatory summary refers to proposals:

• making it mandatory for a councillor appointed as a municipal office bearer to ‘possess the necessary experience, skills or qualifications’
• extending ‘the time period within which a local council must appoint its representatives to the district council’ concerned
• extending ‘the time period within which the first meeting of … (a) council must be called after it has been declared elected’
• prescribing ‘the time period within which a new speaker must be elected’
• extending ‘the time period within which … (a) meeting to determine … members of … (an) executive committee must be held’
• extending ‘the time period within which … (a) meeting for … (electing) a mayor, deputy mayor, an executive mayor and (an) executive deputy mayor must be held’
• prescribing ‘the period in which a (new) executive mayor must be elected after the removal of the (previous) executive mayor’
• prescribing ‘the period in which a mayoral committee must be appointed after the appointment of … (a) newly elected executive mayor’
• requiring provisions for voting at council meetings to include ‘by way of show of hands or secret ballot’, and
• prescribing grounds for removing a municipal officer bearer and the procedure to be followed.

The Cabinet media statement also referred to ‘extensive consultations’ on a draft released in May 2024 for public comment, on which SA Legal Academy reported at the time. These may have included discussions on proposals in a series of amendment Bills prepared on behalf of the Democratic Alliance before the formation of a Government of National Unity (GNU). Two were tabled but allowed to lapse when Parliament rose for the May 2024 elections. In that regard, a link to SA Legal Academy’s report on post-GNU developments is provided below.

• explanatory summary
• Cabinet media statement
• April 2025 SA Legal Academy report

Published by SA Legal Academy Policy Watch

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