The
Tricameral Parliament was the name given to
the
South African parliament and its structure from 1984 to 1994.
While still entrenching the political power of the White section of
the South African population (or, more specifically, that of the
National Party) (NP),
it did give a limited political voice to the country's
Coloured and
Indian population groups. The
majority Black population group was still excluded, however.
The Tricameral Parliament can trace its origin back to 1980, when
the South African
Senate was
replaced with the
President's
Council (
Afrikaans: Presidentsraad),
which was an advisory body consisting of sixty nominated members
from the White, Coloured, Indian and
Chinese population groups.
Following a request by
P.W. Botha, the President's Council presented a set of
proposals in 1982 for
constitutional
and political reform. This proposal called for the implementation
of "power sharing" between the White, Coloured and Indian
communities.
The right wing of the NP was very unhappy
about this proposal and a group of its MPs, led by Dr. Andries Treurnicht, a cabinet minister and the leader of the NP
in the Transvaal
province, broke away to form the Conservative Party (CP) in
order to fight for a return to apartheid
in its original form.
However, Botha continued to be in favour of implementing the
President's Council proposal and in 1983 the NP government
introduced a new constitutional framework. This framework proposed
a parliament with three separately elected chambers:
Each of these three chambers would have power over the "own
affairs" (as it was termed) of the population group it represented,
such as
education,
social welfare,
housing,
local government,
arts,
culture and
recreation.
"General affairs", such as
defence,
finance,
foreign policy,
justice,
law and
order,
transport, commerce and
industry, manpower, internal affairs, and
agriculture would require approval from all
three chambers, after consideration by joint standing
committees.
Furthermore, the framework proposed that the government would be
lead by an executive
State President, which would
be selected by an 88-member
electoral
college. This college would be composed of 50 Whites, 25
Coloureds and 13 Indians, each group chosen by its respective house
in parliament. The State President, who was given very broad
executive power, would then appoint a
Cabinet of ministers who would be in
charge of "general affairs" as well as
Ministers' Councils
for each of the three parliamentary chambers to manage their "own
affairs".
Cases of disagreements between the three houses of Parliament on
specific legislation would be resolved by the President's Council.
According to the constitutional proposal, this council would
consist of 60 members – 20 members appointed by the House of
Assembly, 10 by the House of Representatives, five by the House of
Delegates and 25 directly by the State President.
Although ostensibly based on population figures, the numerical
composition of the electoral college and the President's Council
chambers meant that the National Party in power in the White House
of Assembly could not be outvoted by the combined Coloured and
Indian representatives.
In addition, the proposed constitution still made no provision for
the representation of Black South Africans, as the NP still claimed
that they belonged in their respective
homelands, in which they could exercise their
political rights.
In order to approve the proposed constitution, a referendum among
White voters was held on 2 November 1983. Both the
Progressive Federal Party (PFP),
which objected to the exclusion of Blacks, as well as the CP, which
objected to the participation of Coloureds and Indians, campaigned
for a "No" vote. The conservative opposition to the reforms used
banners with the text
"Rhodesia voted yes - vote no!".
reflecting on the transformation to majority rule in
Rhodesia.
However, many PFP followers and parts of the anti-government
English language press supported the new constitution as "a step
in the right direction". Consequently the "Yes" vote won the
referendum by a wide margin, with 1,360,223 votes in favour (66.3%)
and 691,577 against (33.7%). The turnout was 76%. The proposed
constitution was consequently enacted by parliament as the
Republic of South Africa Constitution Act of
1983.
The proposed elections for the House of Representatives and House
of Delegates in August 1984 ran into heavy opposition. The
United Democratic
Front (UDF) was formed by a number of (mainly pro-
African National Congress)
community organisations and
trade unions
in order to oppose and
boycott these
elections. Nevertheless, although the election boycott was widely
supported, the new constitution did come into effect and the
elections were held, see:
1984 South African general
election.
P.W. Botha was subsequently re-elected as State President by the
electoral college.
The Indian and Coloured chambers of the Tricameral Parliament
suffered from a crisis of credibility with election boycotts
leading to notoriously low turnouts (the 1984 House of Delegates
election achieved only a 16.2% poll. Elected officials in these
houses were sometimes scorned for participating in the apartheid
system. In 1987,
Frederik van
Zyl Slabbert, the leader of the opposition in the White
chamber, quit parliamentary politics as he saw it as increasingly
irrelevant to South Africa's political future.
In 1994, ten years after the Tricameral Parliament was formed, one
of the last pieces of legislation it passed was the
Republic of
South Africa Constitution Act of 1994, which paved the way for
the first non-racial elections that were held on
27 April of that year.
The Tricameral Parliament was housed in a new building, designed
and constructed for that purpose, only a short distance from the
Houses of Parliament. Currently (2009) the
National Assembly is
housed in the building of the Tricameral Parliament while the
Council of Provinces is housed
in the old Houses of Parliament. The decor of the current National
Assembly still retains the theme incorporating wooden panels of
tessellating sets of three
triangles.
See also
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