Credit bureaus in South Africa and Namibia : a comparative analysis of the regulatory frameworks evaluated against the World Bank’s principles for credit reporting—Part I

Abstract

Over the years, the South African and Namibian systems have faced challenges relating to credit-information dissemination and, in view of the importance of credit information and credit-information arrangements, it is necessary to consider, evaluate, and compare the jurisdiction-specific measures in order to address identified challenges. We analyse and compare the current frameworks of the two jurisdictions in order to highlight differences. We discuss the World Bank reports on ‘the Observance of Standards and Codes’ for South Africa and Namibia and the ‘General Principles for Credit Reporting’ as general, principled frameworks for the regulation of consumer-information. This is followed by a comparison of the South African and Namibian structures as frameworks with specific structural and substantive features. The discussions focus on the South African National Credit Act 34 of 2005, the South African Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013 and the Namibian Credit Bureau Regulations of 2014. Our aim is to investigate the improvements effected by the systems, the reasons behind these adaptions and, ultimately, the lessons that can be learnt from each jurisdiction.