Covid-19

 

• The one month State of Disaster extension announced by President Cyril Ramaphosa on 11 November was confirmed three days later in the Government Gazette.
• Eased lockdown level one restrictions featured in the President’s speech came into force at 00:01 on 12 November and are outlined in amendments to the disaster management regulations:
  • requiring every visitor to SA to present a ‘valid certificate of a negative test … obtained not more than 72 hours before the date of travel’, or
  • be quarantined at their ‘own cost’
  • allowing ‘small’ international pleasure craft to enter the SA’s seaports (but continuing the prohibition on international passenger ships)
  • permitting the sale and distribution of liquor during licensed trading hours on the understanding that:
    • sales for off-site consumption are subject to applicable licensing laws, and that
    • sales for on-site consumption are limited by the midnight-to -04:00 curfew.
• The President also announced that temporary employer/employee relief scheme benefits will be extended ‘by another month, to 15 October 2020’. This has yet to be confirmed by notice in the Government Gazette.
• A 10 November ministerial directive on lockdown level one measures at correctional centres:
  • amended one issued in September for lockdown level two by:
    • requiring that all visits to these facilities should be by appointment only
    • limiting the number of visits an inmate may receive from members of the public to one per month, and
    • requiring bail review applications in respect of remand detainees to be submitted to court ‘from the third month’ after a detainee’s admission to a remand detention facility.

 

Digital sound broadcasting

 

• Draft regulations were released on 13 November for comment. Among other things, they:
  • confirm that the Independent Communication Authority of SA intends adopting a ‘phased approach’ to issuing licences:
    • beginning with the ‘primary market’ (Gauteng and the Durban/eThekwini and Cape Town metropolitan areas)
  • propose that, pending analogue switch-off, existing sound broadcasting service licensees should be granted the option to ‘simulcast’ their programmes on analogue and digital platforms, and
  • propose that, when the regulations come into force, two years should be allowed to lapse before Icasa issues prospective new market entrants with an invitation to apply for licences.

 

High-demand radio frequency spectrum

 

• On 10 November, the Independent Communication Authority of SA released a document answering stakeholders’ queries about last month’s invitation to apply for a share in the spectrum to be auctioned early next year. Some clarity-seeking questions will only be answered in a reasons document to be published ‘in due course’.

 

Environmental impact assessments

 

• Draft amendments to regulations affecting mining activities were gazetted on 13 November for comment.

 

Broad-based Black Economic Empowerment

 

• Work has begun on developing B-BBEE codes of good practice for legal practitioners. In that regard, stakeholders are referred to:
  • draft statements
  • a summary of key proposals
  • the 2013 generic scorecard
  • guidelines on developing sector codes, and the amended B-BBEE Act.

 

Prepared by Pam Saxby