Mode of exercising legislative powers

(1) Subject to the provisions of section 89(4) of this Constitution the power of Parliament to make laws shall be exercised by Bills passed by the National Assembly, after reference in the cases specified in section 88(2) of this Constitution to the Ntlo ya Dikgosi , and assented to by the President. (2) When a Bill is presented to the President for assent he or she shall either assent or withhold his or her assent. (3) Where the President withholds his or her assent to a Bill, the Bill shall be returned to the National Assembly. (4) If where the President withholds his or her assent to a Bill the Assembly resolves within six months of the Bill being returned to it that the Bill should again be presented for assent, the President shall assent to the Bill within 21 days of its being again presented to him or her, unless he or she sooner dissolves Parliament. (5) When a Bill that has been duly passed and presented for assent is assented to in accordance with the provisions of this Constitution it shall become law and the President shall thereupon cause it to be published in the Gazette as a law. (6) No law made by Parliament shall come into operation until it has been published in the Gazette , but Parliament may postpone the coming into operation of any such law and may make laws with retrospective effect. (7) All laws made by Parliament shall be styled “Acts” and the words of enactment shall be “enacted by the Parliament of Botswana”.