A partnership between nonprofits the Parliamentary Monitoring Group (PMG), OpenUpSA, and the Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse, has resulted in the development of a new digital tool that enhances transparency, accountability, and public engagement in Parliament.

Nonprofit Ground Work Collective CEO and founder Mbali Ntuli said on Thursday that the newly launched ParliMeter would help citizens keep track of what parliamentarians were doing and hold them and their political parties accountable.

The platform, which is co-funded by the EU, offers real-time data for parliamentary activities such as attendance, and Bill progress.

ParliMeter aims to simplify access to parliamentary data, empowering citizens and civil society to hold representatives accountable. By enhancing public engagement and monitoring, the platform seeks to invigorate Parliament’s oversight role and promote informed civic participation.

“In future, we aim to add more rich data including, but not limited to, voting patterns, public participation, oral and written questions, as well as meeting scheduling efficiency,” the PMG explained.

Speaking during the launch, Ntuli pointed to the importance of the initiative noting her own frustration, during her time in the legislature, that very few people knew about the public participation committee, one of the most powerful committees, which has the powers to subpoena anyone.

She explained that any member of the public is welcome to put any kind of issue to the committee and have it resolved, if it is not already in court.

“…and yet when we ask citizens whether they know about this committee, most of the people say no. And this is one of the problems we have in our country is that we are in the crisis that we are in because so much of our populists are not well educated on the civics and political systems that exists,” Ntuli pointed out.

She said South Africa had one of the most participatory democracies on paper, and legislation that allowed citizens to be a part of decision-making at every single step.

“And yet as citizens we have not being taking that opportunity and it is no wonder when only 58% of us go out to vote, that we have the crisis we have,” she stated.

She noted worries about the annual Budget speech, saying it was a direct result of citizens not participating in the country’s democracy.

The annual Budget speech meant to be delivered last month, was postponed owing to disagreements within the Government of National Unity. The speech will be tabled on March 12.

She highlighted that the ParliMeter had come at an excellent time, noting that the country was a growing and an ever-changing democracy.

“Because now the psychological barrier has been broken on believing that you can have one party that can be dominant for so long. Finally, as South Africans we see that there is a lot of of power in not just voting but participating,” she said.

She pointed out that increasingly more citizens would have access to parliamentary information.

“I think the launch of this tool is going to be important for every South African, to understand what their public representatives are doing, and more importantly to be able to put pressure on those political parties, public representatives,” she explained.

She noted that the country’s democracy was not strong owing to great politicians, but rather because of citizens that were able to hold politicians accountable.

The ParliMeter website can be accessed here: https://www.parlimeter.org.za/