Party leaders request meeting with Ramaphosa over pressing national issues

Leaders of opposition parties represented in Parliament have expressed “deep concern” over the dysfunctional state of South Africa’s state security apparatus and the risk this poses to the country’s security.

Political leaders from different political parties – the United Democratic Movement (UDM) Democratic Alliance (DA), Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), Freedom Front Plus (FF Plus) and the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), among others – met in Cape Town on Tuesday in a meeting convened by UDM leader Bantu Holomisa.

The meeting discussed issues of national importance related to state security, the implementation of investigative reports, the national state of disaster, coalition governments, growing anti-immigrant sentiments in South Africa and parliamentary processes.

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The meeting resolved to request a meeting with President Cyril Ramaphosa and National Assembly Speaker Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula to discuss these issues and other urgent matters facing Parliament and the country.

Investigative reports

Holomisa said the parties agreed to set in motion a process to establish parliamentary ad hoc committees to ensure the implementation of the recommendations and findings of reports into the Public Investment Corporation (PIC), the High-Level Review Panel report into the State Security Agency (SSA) and the reports of the Commission of Inquiry into Allegations of State Capture.  

The UDM leader said the parliamentary ad hoc committees would also ensure the monitoring of cases that need to go to the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) and other law enforcement agencies for investigation and prosecution.  

“Who’s going to implement those findings given that the president of the ruling party is also the head of government? the question is whether he would be a fair leader to do that task given that his own political party is a beneficiary on these looted resources,” Holomisa said.

July unrest

Holomisa said the leaders of parties agreed further on establishing a parliamentary ad hoc committee to ensure the implementation of the recommendations and findings of the report of the expert panel into the July 2021 civil unrest.

The meeting also agreed to set up a parliamentary committee to independently inquire into the circumstances that led to the deadly unrest in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng that claimed the lives of more than 300 people and caused economic damage running into billions of rand.   

State of disaster

Party leaders discussed the extension of the national state of disaster, Holomisa said.

He said expressed concern about the “deleterious effects” of the implementation of the act on South Africans’ livelihoods since March 2020. Parties unanimously agreed that the state of disaster should therefore be lifted.

The national state of disaster on Tuesday was extended by another month yet again, despite growing calls for the state of disaster to be scrapped.

The extension was published in the government gazette on Monday, and was granted “taking into account the need to continue augmenting the existing legislation and contingency arrangements undertaken by organs of state to address the impact of the disaster”.

The latest extension could see the state of disaster ending on 15 April as government continues to finalise the new National Health Act regulations.

Compiled by Thapelo Lekabe

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