A legal debate is raging within the National Council of Provinces’ select committee on land and mineral resources over whether it can accept 56 new amendments to the Mineral and Petroleum Resources Development Amendment Bill. The 56 amendments were introduced into the bill by the Department of Mineral Resources after it was referred back to Parliament by President Jacob Zuma at the beginning of 2016. The department introduced the new amendments after the bill was processed by Parliament’s mineral resources portfolio committee, relying on the public consultation by provincial legislatures as the vehicle to do so. But Parliament’s legal advisers say this was not the correct procedure to follow. The confusion over the amendments means that four-and-a-half years after the introduction of the bill into Parliament, there is no clear path towards it becoming law — despite the industry’s urgent need for legal certainty over the law’s provisions. The joint rules of Parliament stipulate that ...
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