Secrecy Bill deliberations may be cut short

A Business Day report notes that the ad hoc committee dealing with the Bill was given until 23 September to complete its work and it now appears Parliament will rise on 15 September. The report notes the ad hoc committee has twice missed deadlines and has had to have its life span extended by a resolution of the National Assembly. Making the announcement to the MPs, committee chairman Cecil Burgess, of the ANC, indicated that even more time would be lost because he wanted MPs to consider a final printed Bill before they sent it to the National Assembly. This was to ensure that the Bill accurately reflected what had been decided in committee deliberations. Despite the concerns of non-ANC committee members, Burgess appeared to be firm that the work on the Bill needed to be completed by 15 September, raising speculation that the many controversial issues - including the issue of a 'public interest' defence - that have yet to be decided would be forced through. Full Business Day report

The ANC offered a concession yesterday when it came up with a narrowed definition of national security. The party abandoned its proposal to pass the Bill without a definition of national security, instead tabling a rewritten, simplified definition of the concept, which will serve as the only justification for classifying information. A report on the News24 site says it gives the meaning of national security as the protection of the people of SA and the territorial integrity of the Republic against the threat of the use of force, war, terrorism, espionage, violence and sabotage. This part of the definition was taken almost verbatim from a proposal by media lawyer Dario Milo. His work was in turn based on the Johannesburg Principles, drafted by international law, security and human rights experts in 1995. Full report on the News24 site

However, the ANC has rejected the notion that all state secrets be automatically declassified after 20 years. Although the Bill allows for heads of state organs to make a special application to keep information secret, MP Luwellyn Landers said the ANC was 'uncomfortable' with the idea of automatic declassification, and would not support it. According to a report in The Times, Premesh Lalu, a University of the Western Cape history professor and director of the Centre of Humanities Research, described the ANC's decision as 'very troubling and a cause for dismay'. 'Most archives in the world work with a statute of limitation and it is incredibly important in SA to have access to documents to write this moment of history,' said Lalu. Many documents from the time of the negotiated settlement in the early 1990s are still classified and need to be declassified for the public to get a full understanding of what took place after the unbanning of political parties and before the 1994 elections, Lalu said. Full report in The Times