OP-ED: Parliament must use its power to ensure firm constitutional oversight within the law

Parliament must use its power to ensure firm constitutional oversight within the law

Parliamentary oversight is most effective when it is both firm and constitutionally disciplined. The Portfolio Committee on Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (the COGTA Committee) has an opportunity to use its considerable powers to address concerns about the CRL Rights Commission and its Section 22 Committee process for the development of a “legislative framework” and a religious "code of ethical conduct", while respecting the boundaries that protect the CRL Commission's independence and the integrity of Parliament's oversight.

At its meeting of 24 June 2026, the COGTA Committee tabled a draft report with five recommendations, and its Chairperson, Dr Zweli Mkhize, added several oral proposals. The concern behind them is understandable. Complaints have been made about the conduct of the CRL Commission's Chairperson, and many faith communities did not ask for this Section 22 Committee process. Nobody, least of all FOR SA, defends abuse, coercion or exploitation in religious settings; such conduct must be met firmly through the ordinary law. The difficulty lies in how the Section 22 Committee proposes to address these concerns.

The starting point is the constitutional boundary between robust oversight and institutional management. The Commission for the Promotion and Protection of the Rights of Cultural, Religious and Linguistic Communities (the CRL Commission) is an independent institution established under Chapter 9 of the Constitution. Section 181 makes these institutions subject only to the Constitution and the law, and says plainly that no person or organ of state may interfere with their functioning. A portfolio committee is a parliamentary oversight body: it may question, request documents, investigate, and make findings and recommendations. What it may not do is step into the CRL Commission's shoes and exercise powers the law has given to it alone.

That boundary shapes how the draft recommendations on the Section 22 Committee should be refined. Under the CRL Act, such a committee is established by the CRL Commission, which sets its functions, appoints its chairperson and determines its procedure. Those levers belong to the Commission. The COGTA Committee cannot itself reconstitute that body, add members to it, or direct its composition. It can recommend that the Commission attend to inclusivity, which is legitimate oversight, but it cannot make or implement the decision for the Commission. Oversight is not management, and a recommendation is not an instruction.

The same applies to the proposal to handle the complaints against the CRL Chairperson informally. The COGTA Committee Chairperson suggested, in effect, that she be told to "stay out" of the process and to stop making public statements, that this be conveyed through a meeting with the Speaker, and that a formal inquiry be held only if she refused. Whatever the intention, this raises serious concern. Neither the COGTA Committee nor the Speaker has the power to direct a sitting commissioner to withdraw from a statutory process or to refrain from public comment. The Committee's lawful options, short of removal, are to investigate, question, criticise and make non-binding recommendations, while any recusal or internal disciplinary measure must arise under section 15 of the CRL Act or the Commission's own processes. Removal, if warranted, must follow section 17 of the CRL Act and section 194 of the Constitution. An informal arrangement to secure her withdrawal or silence is not a lawful substitute, and could risk the very interference the Constitution forbids.

The serious complaints against the CRL Chairperson should instead be assessed on their merits, after the relevant documents are produced and with full procedural fairness. The evidence before the Committee warrants requiring the CRL Chairperson to answer the material questions on the record, protecting complainants, office-bearer and oversight alike.

The COGTA Committee can make its strongest contribution by focusing on unresolved questions squarely within its mandate, several of which have been deferred while some of the CRL Chairperson's statements remain unanswered. One is the repeated claim that the Section 22 Committee members represent between 40 and 45 million Christians. No supporting sources or methodology have been disclosed, while independent demographic evidence and submissions to the Committee indicate that this claim of legitimacy is seriously overstated and should be clarified on the record.

Another concerns the National Lotteries Commission (NLC). That matter was proposed for closure because the NLC stated that no funding went directly to the Cheryl Zondi Foundation (CZF), of which the Chairperson was deputy chairperson. Yet the NLC said only that it was unable conclusively to confirm indirect funding, while acknowledging that lottery-funded work was rolled out in partnership with the CZF. Whether Parliament was given accurate information on the funding is not the core issue; the core issue is the complaint that the CRL Chairperson has a conflict of interest, because she concurrently holds the office of Deputy Chair of an activist organisation that highlights abuses by pastors. That is why the COGTA Committee should continue its oversight and investigate the legitimate complaints made against her.

Then there is the question of prudence. The lawfulness of the Section 22 process is being challenged in the High Court. Multiple faith communities and representative bodies have asked the COGTA Committee to give an undertaking not to adopt, endorse or rely upon any report from that process until the litigation is finally resolved. That request is not an attempt to stall oversight. It protects oversight: declining to build on a foundation the courts may yet remove ensures that due process is respected and legitimate outcomes protected.

This also highlights the question of the money being spent on the Section 22 Committee process. If it is found to be unlawful, then whatever has been spent on it will be fruitless and wasteful. Yet the draft report is largely silent on the legal basis, design and cost of the Section 22 Committees, even as similar structures are reportedly being established for other faith communities. On a deliberately conservative projection placed before the Committee by FOR SA, the Christian-sector process alone could cost in the region of R5 million, before any replication across other faiths and before litigation exposure. Ensuring public money is spent lawfully and within mandate is among an oversight committee's clearest duties. It should be asking for the establishing resolutions, terms of reference, budgets and actual expenditure, not passing over them.

To its credit, the COGTA Committee recognised some of this: Members themselves cautioned that it should act within its mandate and obtain a legal opinion first. Parliament can hold the CRL Commission properly to account, and in doing so it should recognise the voluntary code of conduct the sector has already developed.

Protecting congregants and respecting the Constitution are not competing but complementary goals. The COGTA Committee's lawful authority is already considerable, and by using it decisively, pursuing accountability fairly, safeguarding public funds, and testing any genuine legal gaps against the Constitution and generally applicable law, it can provide the firm, credible oversight South Africans deserve.