The Electoral Amendment Bill incorporates a proposed electoral system which seeks to retain the current electoral system unchanged in line with the Cabinet Resolution. The present system provides for 400 seats in the National Assembly to be filled in an election where voters vote for a party. The party is allocated a number of seats proportional to the percentage of the tota number of votes attracted by the party, the seats are filled from nine regional lists of candidates, topped up, if necessary, from the national list of candidates.

The proposed Bill also retains the current system for the provincial legislatures and further regulates the modalities of conducting elections and allocation of seats in the National Assembly and Provincial Legislatures.

The Bill has now been referred to the State Law Advisors for certification.

The introduction of this Bill follows the recommendation of the South African Law Commission.

The Bill aims to provide legal mechanisms in terms of which any person who has undergone a sex change operation may apply to the Director-General of the Department of Home Affairs for the alterations of his/her sex description in the National Population Register.

The Bill is currently tabled in parliament.

3. Films and Publications Amendment Bill

The main objective of this Bill is to make provision for the prohibition of child pornography accessed through the internet and for matters incidental to the more effective investigation and prosecution of child pornography offenders.

Prosecutors and police highlighted the frustrations experienced in the investigation and prosecution of recent child pornography offenders, noting in particular that the accused often escaped Penal sanction provided by the Act, on grounds which did not apply to offences of a similar serious nature.

The Bill includes amendments to the definition of child pornography because the present definition is limiting in that it does not cover all aspects relating to child pornography.

This Bill has been approved by Cabinet and has been sent to the State Law Advisor for certification.

Cabinet recommended that this Bill be withdrawn. The Cabinet agreed that -

(a) the Bill be withdrawn in view of an earlier decision by the Cabinet on 28 May 2003;

(b) the opportunity should be utilised for marriage laws to be rationalised into one comprehensive piece of legislation reflecting all the 'different kinds of marriages in our society. The opportunity should also be utilised to begin the process of overhauling the concept and conception of marriage, taking into account numerous jurisprudential developments in South Africa as well as in other countries since the enactment of the Marriage Act in 1961;

(c) Clause 10(3) of the current Bill should be deleted in the revised Bill.

The South African Citizenship Second Amendment Bill intends to bring the South African Citizenship Act, 1995 in line with section 20 of the Constitution as far as dual citizenship is concerned. It repeals the provision which allowed the Minister to deprive a citizen of his or her citizenship for having used the citizenship of a foreign country to enter or depart from the Republic, or to enter or depart from the country which issued such passport or any other third countries. The Bill replaces such provision with one which imposes penalties on a citizen using a foreign passport to enter or depart from the Republic or utilizes his or her foreign citizenship while in the Republic.

This Bill was submitted to Cabinet through the Cabinet Committee for Governance and Administration which Committee made certain recommendations.

The Bill has been approved by Cabinet and has been referred to the State Law Advisors for certification.

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