Ramaphosa’s ConCourt bid ‘not about avoiding accountability’

With President Cyril Ramaphosa’s fate still in the balance, the debate on whether parliament is protecting him continues, with opposition parties set on voting in favour of the Section 89 panel’s report during the parliamentary sitting next week.

The African Transformation Movement (ATM) and the Democratic Alliance (DA) said parliament’s postponement was “neither here, nor there” but agreed a deeper interrogation of the Phala Phala scandal was needed, as they continue to pile pressure on Ramaphosa.

Ramaphosa adopting same tactics

DA leader John Steenhuisen claimed parliament and the parliamentary majority were being used to protect the president.

“This is not the first time this happened, we had it with former president Jacob Zuma, who Ramaphosa ousted on the wave of fighting corruption, and who himself used his parliamentary majority to shield himself from accountability from parliament.

“So this is not new territory; it’s Ramaphosa adopting the very same tactics that were used by his predecessor for almost a decade to protect himself from any form of accountability.”

Steenhuisen told CNN it was time for the people of South Africa to decide what would happen going forward, “[rather than] a 200 ANC member caucus [or] a 4 000-member national executive committee”.

READ MORE: Ramaphosa now powerless against corrupt officials, says Steenhuisen on Phala Phala saga

The National Assembly programming committee (NAPC) postponed the debate on the report to Tuesday next week for the National Assembly meeting to be in-person, with no provision for virtual participation.

“The NAPC has, during its urgent meeting convened on Monday evening, resolved to defer the consideration of the Section 89 panel report to Tuesday, 13 December, at 2pm,” parliament said in a statement.

ANC divisions

ATM chief-of-staff Mxolisi Makhubu said the opposition parties were quite confident “that we are going to be victorious on Tuesday – especially when they’ve all been given time to avail themselves for the voting”.

“The one thing that we were not going to allow was the voting on behalf of the members of parliament. That was a definite no-go zone for us,” Makhubu said.

“What we were trying to stress is that the environment is politically charged, and you already know that, in the [ruling] party as it stands.

“There’s a whole lot of divisions, with some members calling for the president to step down or to step aside.”

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Economic Freedom Fighters leader Julius Malema shared similar sentiments and said, in addition to the impeachment process, Ramaphosa had to face a motion of no confidence.

“We will vote for the impeachment to ensure that Ramaphosa leaves with nothing.

“He must step down and still be impeached,” Malema said.

“Even after he steps down, he must still be arrested because he committed a crime. He has put the country in a state where we are divided. As we speak, he is no longer the president.”

Parliament should do its work

The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) has also made its stance clear and said parliament should be allowed to play its oversight role without any outside intrusion.

Cosatu national spokesperson Sizwe Pamla urged the members of the ANC not to be tempted to use the “ongoing and incomplete process to opportunistically fight their internal battles in the build-up to the ANC 55th national conference”.

“The organisation needs to focus on the myriad of challenges bedevilling it and genuinely commit to a robust process of renewal,” Pamla said.

“This is important if it is to reclaim its strategic high moral ground in society, which is key to deepening the national democratic revolution.”

On Ramaphosa asking the Constitutional Court to review and set aside the Phala Phala report, political analyst Dr Levy Ndou said following a number of criticisms the report received, it was not about “avoiding accountability, but about how the committee came to their conclusion because it appears they took the decision based on hearsay”.

READ MORE: Ramaphosa’s fight back could pick apart Phala Phala panel’s ‘irrational’ errors