‘ANC’s interests come first’: Ruling party slammed for protecting Ramaphosa in Phala Phala vote

Moments after President Cyril Ramaphosa survived an impeachment vote on Tuesday, opposition parties criticised the ruling ANC.

Phala Phala vote

In the National Assembly, 214 MPs voted against adopting the Phala Phala panel’s report. There were 148 votes for ‘yes’, with two abstentions.

Four ANC members – Supra Mahumapelo, Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, Thandiwe Zungu and Mosebenzi Zwane – voted for the report to be adopted.

ANC MPs, however, toed the party line and prevented Ramaphosa from facing an impeachment process at this stage.

Moments after the voting was closed and the motion was defeated, opposition parties slammed the ANC for shielding Ramaphosa.

ALSO READ: Ramaphosa spared as MPs vote against adopting Phala Phala report

‘The ANC hasn’t changed’

DA leader John Steenhuisen said the results of the vote “shattered the myth of ANC renewal”.

“The ANC we saw in the House today is the same ANC that leapt to the defence of the corrupt former President Jacob Zuma in half a dozen motions of no confidence as well as an impeachment vote,” he said.

Steenhuisen said the ANC had failed at its first opportunity to prove it had changed after being “rebuked” by Chief Justice Raymond Zondo in his state capture report.

The DA leader said the Phala Phala scandal is not going to disappear. He also said the proceedings on Tuesday will be damaging in the long term for the ANC.

“What the ANC has perhaps not yet realised is that the blocking of the report in Parliament today was a pyrrhic victory for them, in that it shattered the myth around the party’s so-called renewal.”

‘So much for a new dawn’

ActionSA leader Herman Mashaba said “history had repeated itself” as the ANC showed South Africans that the party will always come first.

He said ANC MPs had failed to hold the executive to account.

“They did this in defiance of the will of the South African people and to carry out the instruction of the ANC NEC to protect a president at all costs,” he said.

He also compared the Phala Phala scandal to the Nkandla scandal during Jacob Zuma’s presidency.

“The ANC has… copied and pasted the Nkandla playbook and South Africans once again find themselves led by a president with unanswered questions of criminality hanging over his head,” Mashaba said.

He added that South Africans had been let down after hoping that Ramaphosa would turn the country around after “Zuma’s lost decade”.

“South Africa cannot be held hostage by the ANC and must vote it out come 2024.”

ALSO READ: Phala Phala: Must Ramaphosa go? These ANC members voted ‘yes’

‘Ramaphosa kicking the public in the teeth’

FF Plus leader Pieter Groenewald said the ANC thinks the party’s and Ramaphosa’s interests are more important than those of South Africa’s.

He criticised Ramaphosa’s refusal to publicly answer questions around the Phala Phala scandal.

Groenewald said South Africans need answers regarding the burglary at the president’s farm.

“By not providing any [answers], President Ramaphosa is kicking the public in the teeth and clearly demonstrating with his conduct that the ANC is much more important than the people of South Africa.”

NOW READ: ‘Their blood will be in your hands’ – Mente tells Mapisa-Nqakula in debate over secret ballot