President Cyril Ramaphosa. Photo: Dwayne Senior/Getty Images
ohOn the eve of national and provincial elections, President Cyril Ramaphosa signed the Cannabis for Personal Use Bill into law.
President Ramaphosa assented to the bill, which has been waiting for his signature for months, on Monday afternoon, just hours before South Africans are due to vote in their most significant election since 1994.
The presidential office said in a statement that the new law would restrict the possession, use and cultivation of cannabis by adults in “private settings”, but that trading would remain illegal.
The new law will remove cannabis from the Narcotics and Drug Trafficking Act, a regulatory milestone that will pave the way for the process of amending many other laws to allow for the industrialization of cannabis.
The law also provides guidance on administering medical marijuana to minors while “protecting children from excessive exposure to marijuana,” the White House said.
The law bans the trade of cannabis and regulates the amount of cannabis that individuals can cultivate, possess and transport for personal and private use, but it is understood the state intends to lay out the framework for eventual legalisation of this in terms of a National Cannabis Master Plan.
In 2018, the Constitutional Court struck down a law criminalizing cannabis and gave the canton two years to enact legislation to address the situation.
But the process will only begin in earnest in 2021, having been delayed by more than three years after an earlier draft submitted by the state's legal adviser was not approved.
The President also recently signed into law bills including the National Health Insurance Bill, the Gender-Based Violence and Femicide Bill and the National Prosecuting Authority Amendment Bill.
