South Africa’s parliament has passed legislation aimed at better protecting state secrets, but the measure has been widely criticised for provisions that could help the government hide corruption. The following are a few major provisions contained in the legislation known as the Protection of Information Bill.
* The bill is aimed at ensuring “a coherent approach to protection of state information and the classification and declassification of state information and will create a legislative framework for the state to respond to espionage and other associated hostile activities”.
* Foreign spies are required to register their status as agents with the government or face between three and five years in prison.
* The measure applies to all organs of the state, including municipalities, with the state security minister deciding what is a part of the government.
* The measure applies to all information regarded as ”valuable” to the state. The state security minister within 12 months of the commencement of the act can prescribe categories of information that are valuable and subject to protection.
* State agencies will set up procedures for managing sensitive information.
* Sensitive information includes matters “relating to the protection and preservation of all things owned or maintained for the public by the state”, state security, economic growth, scientific achievements and diplomacy.
* Any head of an organ of state may classify or reclassify information. The State Security Ministry is the gate keeper for the classification.
* Unauthorised possession of classified material is a criminal act.
* Material remains classified for no longer than 20 years, unless the state provided a compelling reason to keep it secret.
* The branch that classifies information can decide whether to grant requests for declassification.
* The unlawful delivery and distribution of “top secret” material can be punished by 15 to 25 years in jail.
* The unlawful delivery and distribution of “classified” material carries a three- to five-year prison term.
* Computer hacking of state records is a criminal offence punishable by five to 10 years in jail.
* Any person who publishes or discloses state secrets faces up to 10 years in prison and those conspiring with that person also face jail terms.
* Any government official who classifies information not considered as being valuable to the state faces up to three years in jail.
Credit to: Times Live
This is worse than the previous White NP Government.
It shows that Black ‘leaders’ are just so power-mad that they deprive the people of all the basic freedoms that we are entitled to.
Is this yet another example of what the ANC, Communist P, UDF, PAC & AZAPO meant by their form of
‘Liberation” and ‘Freedom” ?
When is all of this mismanagement, incompetence and money wasting etc going to end?
More than R45m is being used to pay the salaries of suspended public servants who await disciplinary proceedings to be concluded, according to a report on Thursday.
A recent Public Service Commission report dated June 2011, was tabled in Parliament on Wednesday, The Star newspaper reported.
It quoted an earlier study conducted by the public service and administration department which found that a number of officials investigated for financial misconduct increased from 434 in the 2001/02 financial year to 1 135 in 2009/10.
According to the study, 369 state employees were suspended between April 2009 and March last year at a cost of R45.7m, the newspaper reported.
The department of correctional services had the highest number of so called “precautionary suspensions” at 73, which cost taxpayers R7m. The department of justice followed with 41, costing about R6.4m.
However, the study did not include figures from the department of home affairs, which, according to the more recent PSC report, is among departments with the highest number of suspended officials.
A Secrecy Bill is to cover up all their evil doings and corruption, just as they had done at the TRC.
The ANC-SACP must come clean on it’s atrocities, just as the British Apartheid Regimes and Corporation Bosses should too, in their complicities of abuses too that are kept SECRET and all these ‘confidentiality’ claues etc must also be made null and void and the TRUTH must be heard and told.
Expose your Quattro etc and Southern African Atrocities too.
We have had enough of Great British controlled Propaganda, scams and untruths about decent, innocent and vulnerable people, including of Dr. Kelly, the plutonium murder of the Russia ex-friend of evil Brezofsky and …… who are also a part of the British Apartheid Mafiozi of Criminal Secrecy Establishment, with it’s evil mi5, 6 & 8 lies of the man leaving ‘traes’ of plutonium on a flight to London crap himself, similar to their response of Dr. Kelly’s ‘suicide’, Mr. Gareth William’s ‘suicide’ in a tiny case in a bath crap, ‘investigations and Experts’ junk again – they eally think that the people are fools and believe their crap.
Their corrupt biased Levison ‘commission’, that ‘investigates’ Mr. Murdoch and his News of World Staff that tells us TRUTHS, but NOT investigating their massive British Apartheid Media propagandists of since 1800′s and Worldwide and who control the Internet too, but allow their Great evil Pornography, Scams etc.
ANC etc too has atrocities of since 1950′s to divulge, so why are they not doing so?
Judge Claudine had discovered British TRUTHS & FACTS of since 1800′s now Britain also censors Wikipedia which it also owns and controls too – so we have NO means of decent, free and TRUTHFUL disclosures of the TRUTH & FACTS of these satanic Power Abusers. The same is happening in the money-wasting, corrupt, thieving, incompetent Land estitution ‘commission’ and ‘courts’ of British Controlled and assisted terrorist ANC-SACP.
We have seen her proofs and therfore support her and not the secret criminals.