PUBLIC PROCUREMENT ACT: DA and ACTIONSA PROPOSE SEPARATE AMENDMENT BILLS

PUBLIC PROCUREMENT ACT: DA and ACTIONSA PROPOSE SEPARATE AMENDMENT BILLS

• 07 August 2026
• National Treasury
• SA Legal Academy

Please note: 1) According to parliamentary papers published on 3 July 2026, the Public Procurement Amendment Bill tabled by DA MP Mathew Cuthbert has been withdrawn. 2) More recent parliamentary papers have since confirmed that DA MP George Michalakis tabled a Bill with the same title and similar intent on 18 August 2026. The deadline for public comment on that Bill remains 6 September 2026.

Input is sought on two sets of proposals for amendments to the yet-to-be implemented 2024 Public Procurement Act. The deadline for comments on each set of proposals is 6 September 2026. 

One amendment Bill is being prepared for Democratic Alliance (DA) MP George Michalakis. The other is being prepared for ActionSA MP Alan Beesley. This is according to the Government Gazette notices concerned, which were published as pre-tabling explanatory summaries of the legislation envisaged.

Neither set of proposals refers to public procurement-related amending legislation either already before Parliament or released earlier for public comment.

That said, Beesley’s proposals appear to augment a Public Procurement Second Amendment Bill tabled in March 2026 by ActionSA MP Malebo Kobe – on which SA Legal Academy reported at the time. Yet to be considered by the National Assembly committee concerned, it does not cover the issue of debarment – the focus of Beesely’s intended Bill. According to its explanatory summary, the legislation envisaged will seek to:

• ‘strengthen procurement integrity by enhancing the debarment framework in the principal Act’
• empower the Public Procurement Office to ‘intervene where procuring institutions fail or unreasonably delay initiating debarment proceedings’
• prescribe ‘time periods for the initiation and completion of debarment proceedings’
• require the Public Procurement Office to ‘update the public debarment register within a specified period’, and
• require procuring institutions to ‘report annually to the Public Procurement Office on supplier misconduct, debarment decisions and decisions not to initiate debarment proceedings’.

Amending legislation envisaged by the DA’s George Michalakis appears to be similar to proposals gazetted by DA MP Mathew Cuthbert in December 2025, on which SA Legal Academy reported at the time.

• explanatory summary of latest proposed DA Bill
• SA Legal Academy report on December 2025 DA proposals
• explanatory summary of latest proposed ActionSA Bill
• SA Legal Academy report on Action SA tabled Bill
• Public Procurement Act

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