Corona and Democracy - South Africa

On this page, we are collecting information on the effects of the measures taken to halt the spread of the COVID-19 virus on democracy in South Africa

Information on COVID-19 measures and democracy
Type of measures Measures & sources
Limitations to freedom of movement
  • Since the 26th March South Africa is in a total lock-down. Except for essential workers everyone is confined to their place of residence. All borders are closed for the time of the lock-down, only some ports are open for the transportation of fuel, cargo and goods. If a person wants to enter or exit the country the permission of the Cabinet Minister for home affairs or of a person designated by him is needed.
  • All commuter transport services are prohibited except for essential workers. However, busses, taxis and cars that are carrying them have stricter requirements due to the capacity.
  • Breaking these rules is punished either by paying a fine and/or imprisonment (max. 6 months).
  • All rules are made for the period lock-down which was firstly scheduled to 21 days, but after a re-evaluation the President of South Africa declared on 9th April that the rules are expanded until the end of April.
Some of the lockdown restrictions would be eased from May and further from 1 June.
 
28 May:
  • Alert Level 3 will apply as of June 1, easing previous restrictions
Limitations to electoral rights
  • South Africa’s by-elections are postponed, the elections where dated for March, April and May. Because these are by-elections they usually take place in a 90 days after the general election timeframe, but this time it is expanded to maximum 120 days.
Limitation to civil rights
  • All criminal trials are postponed to a time after the lock-down, civil cases need to be identified as urgent or essential services to be placed on the court roll. All courts are still open.
Risks to data security

  • A database (“COVID-19 Tracing Database”) has been established to trace people who are known or reasonable suspected to have contact to an infected person. The data includes: full name, ID or passport number, address, cellular phone numbers of all persons who have been tested for COVID-19, the test result and the details of the known or suspected contacts of any person who tested positive. The tracing starts on 5th March and ends whenever the state of disaster has lapsed or has been terminated. Within 6 weeks after that happens, all data should be de-identified and used for further research. The database is confidential.
Limitations to freedom of information
  • 16 March: The government decreed on telecommunication regulation: radio services are required to stream public announcements on COVID; internet providers are obliged to remove "fake news" from their platforms immediately after identifying it; and national address systems and databases must be made available to assist the government in tracking and tracing individuals infected or exposed
Emergency powers for government
  • No state of emergency has been enforced. The government declared the state of disaster on 15 March under the Disaster Management Act 2002. The Act allows the government to enforce a series of regulations restricting, amongst other things, the movement of persons, goods and the dissemination of information and to establish a National Disaster Management Centre with the duties of making recommendations in legislative drafts.
Corona laws - full text
Various  
 
Last updated on 10.06.2020

 

Please note that we are constantly updating the information under rapidly changing circumstances, the information on this page should not be taken to be a complete overview of measures in a country. 

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