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00:00But first, ahead of the May 29th election, South Africa's president Cyril Ramaphosa
00:05has signed off on a new law, bringing in big changes to the rules about political funding.
00:10Opposition parties were against the bill, saying that it makes the system more opaque.
00:15But Cyril Ramaphosa says that it's in fact opening up the political space and levelling
00:20the playing field as it allows independent candidates to, once elected, access the multi-party
00:26democracy fund.
00:29Jan Vensel breaks it all down for us.
00:33President Cyril Ramaphosa has effectively amended the Political Party Funding Act to
00:38allow independent candidates to access the multi-party democracy fund, once elected.
00:45This is the first time that independent candidates are contesting the South African national
00:49elections.
00:50But many parties have been calling the bill unconstitutional, as it essentially means
00:55that parties no longer have to report or keep records on how much funding they've
00:59received, which some fear means that limits are very unlikely to be followed.
01:05Critics fear this loss of transparency is the opposite of what South Africa's historically
01:10corruption-prone political landscape needs.
01:14Campaigns are expensive.
01:15A national campaign for the governing ANC or its rival, the DA, could easily run to
01:19around 3 million euros.
01:22Its stakes are being ramped up ever higher ahead of the election on the 29th.
01:26The ANC has been the last party to release its campaign posters or T-shirts, doing so
01:31just about a week ago, pretty late in the game.
01:34Many have even voiced concern about the financial health of the ruling party.
01:39But the ANC says the delay in getting their campaign promo material out was because they
01:44needed more time to cover their national footprint, while also admitting that new legislation
01:49has made it much harder to raise funds.
02:19While the new act gives the president the power to set a new limit and threshold, he
02:40can only do so if instructed by parliament.