Amendments to the National Estuarine Management Protocol publishedThe final amendments to the National Estuarine Management Protocol have been published for implementation. Source: Photo by Kelly Lacy from Pexels These amendments address implementation issues and the impact of the 2016 Supreme Court of Appeal judgment in Abbott v Overstrand Municipality. “The judgment found that the assignment of functions to municipalities in the existing Protocol presented constitutional challenges, as the assignment should have been done in terms of Integrated Coastal Management Act, and not the Protocol,” the Department of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment said on Tuesday. To address the unconstitutionality of the Protocol, the department went through an extensive stakeholder consultation that culminated in an agreement to amend the following paragraphs of the Protocol:
The Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment, Barbara Creecy, published a notice in the Government Gazette, Vol 672 (Notice No. 44724) for the implementation of the amended National Estuarine Management Protocol on 18 June 2021. A copy of the amended Protocol can be downloaded from the department’s website: www.environment.gov.za or can be obtained electronically upon request by email to Ruwen Pillay on az.vog.tnemnorivne@yallipur. |