THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH

The executive branch is responsible for the day-to-day running of the country. It consists of the president, deputy president and cabinet, and they oversee the public service. Some of the functions of the executive are to:

• Initiate laws and policy
• Carry out laws passed by parliament
• Carry out policies
• Co-ordinate the functions of the government departments and administrators
• Provide direction to heads of government departments
• Plan, monitor and evaluate government programmes

KEY ROLE-PLAYERS AND STRUCTURES IN THE EXECUTIVE

It is important to know what structures exist as they can be useful as a point of entry for your lobbying action.

The president, cabinet and deputy ministers are called the executive. The head of state is the president who leads the cabinet. The national assembly elects the president from among its members and leads the country following the Constitution and the law. The key role-players in the executive that may play a role in formulating policy or drafting law will be:

• The president
• The deputy president
• Ministers, directors general and other senior managers who are in charge of different government departments
• Inter-departmental committees. Often policy will cut across a number of ministries and departments. Inter-departmental committees are set up using representatives from different departments, to deal with the policy as a whole and provide direction to directors general who head the public service. For example, in the case of delivery of water, this may involve the departments of water and sanitation, environmental affairs, human settlements, finance and cooperative government.

LEGISLATIVE BRANCH

The functions of the legislative branch of government are to:

• Develop and pass laws
• Contribute to developing policy
• Act as a watchdog on the activities of government
• Pass budgets and get reports from departments

The legislature consists of the national parliament made up of different structures, for example, a National Assembly, National Council of Provinces (NCOP) and various parliamentary committees. These are the key structures that you can lobby in the legislature:

PARLIAMENTARY COMMITTEES

The national parliament usually divides the members of parliament into small groups which focus on specific areas of governance. These smaller groups are called parliamentary or portfolio committees. The main role of the portfolio committees is to:

• Make sure that policy issues and new bills are properly debated and looked at carefully
• Allow members of parliament to become specialised in a particular field of interest, such as defence or agriculture
• Provide a forum where the public can interact with parliament and government on specific issues and new bills
• Discuss and assess the activities of other government departments

There are about 40 portfolio committees in national parliament, one for each government department and several internal to parliament. For example there are portfolio committees on correctional services, health and international relations and cooperation.

The parliamentary committees of the National Council of Provinces are called Select Committees. There are 11 Select Committees that manage the issues sent to them by the portfolio committees of national parliament.

 Other important role-players in the legislature:

• The speaker of parliament
• Political party whips (responsible for each party’s members of parliament)
• Parliamentary committee chairpersons
• Committee secretaries
• Political party caucuses, where party members meet to discuss the party positions on an issue (these are closed to the public but key members can be lobbied before meetings to raise issues)