South Africa is one of the countries which acceded to the APRM in 2003. Accordingly, South Africa appointed a National Governing Council (NGC) under the chairpersonship of the Minister of Public Services and Administration as the focal point to develop a strategy to manage the national APRM process. The NGC was constituted of business, the disabled, civil society, churches, trade unions, government and women's coalitions thus ensuring all relevant stakeholders are represented. As part of South Africa's country assessment, questionnaires dealing with the four core thematic areas of the APRM were sent through to the public by community development workers. The four thematic areas are democracy and good political governance, economic governance and management, corporate governance and socio-economic development. In addition, four technical assessment agencies were appointed to assist in conducting research on the four thematic areas. The primary objective of this study is to examinethe theoretical approach to the study and the African Peer Review Mechanism's contemporary relevance to South Africa, its intended beneficiaries and an assessment of South Africa for the period 2006.