Federalism: DA wary of report that may reduce number of provinces

A report which was commissioned by former provincial and local government minister Sydney Mufamadi and which seeks to advise on the way in which provincial and local government function will be published later in the year.

In an interview with the Saturday Star Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs Minister Sicelo Shiceka confirmed that South Africans will only know whether there will be a reduction in the number of provinces after the report is published and then finalised by March 2010.

Of course this is nothing new to the ANC’s alliance partners who have previously questioned the make-up of the current two-tier system and called for its revision.

The Democratic Alliance, on the other hand, having just claimed power in the Western Cape, will view this as a cunning plan to circumvent them by means of merging that province with others which are overwhelmingly ANC.

The Sunday Times on the other hand quotes Minister of Performance Monitoring and Evaluation Collins Chabane as saying

“South Africa is not the combination of municipalities or a combination of provinces. So we’re not a federal state, we are a unitary state. It’s one country, which, for governance purposes, has been divided into three spheres — provincial, national and local.

“Therefore, if a decision has been made by the national government to act in a particular way — as long as we don’t encroach on the constitutional responsibility of the other sphere of government — we think there should be no problem.”

Chabane denied that the government would be interfering in the provinces and I would recommend that you read the short article not only to place the minister’s comments in context, but to gain a better understanding of where the new planning commission in the Presidency fits into all of this.

The breakdown of provinces is going to become a political hot potato come the end of the year so best you start familiarising yourselves with the arguments now.

What is certain is that many will view minister Chabane’s take on South Africa being a unitary state as rather simplistic. While the provinces do not enjoy autonomy along the lines of the states in the United States there is a growing trend of identifying a certain measure of independence of the parts that make up the whole.

This does not anticipate separate countries but rather that provinces do, to some degree, want to exercise a measure of autonomy when it comes to regulating affairs peculiar to their region.

While the premiers do not amount to governors we hear silly talk of Western Cape Premier Helen Zille trying to create a Bantustan in that province. This in itself is recognition of some form of separation failing which would be tantamount to suggesting that the government — of the unitary state – is part of that.

Needless to say both suggestions are nonsense.

It will be interesting to hear your views on the provinces :

Are they more autonomous than the government believes?

Should they be?

What are your feelings on a unitary state as opposed to federalism?

Try and leave your racist hats at home and tackle the issue on its merits.

You may begin now.