It’s ‘unrealistic’ to expect Ramaphosa to force ministers to obey parliament

With Tourism Minister Lindiwe Sisulu having snubbed Parliament on several occasions recently, as well as State Security Minister in the Presidency Mondli Gungubele – and his deputy – the questions being asked is: Is the fish rotting from the head?

For weeks, President Cyril Ramaphosa has failed to open up over the burglary at his Phala Phala game ranch in Limpopo, where potentially millions of unaccounted Rands were stolen.

Political analyst Ralph Mathekga said the snubbing of parliament by executives shows that they do not take it seriously and one has to wonder what they take seriously.

“Parliament is the first line of accountability, if you do not take parliament seriously, there’s no way you can argue that you are accounting somewhere else in other institutions, so it does not make sense at all,” said Mathekga.

He added it did not help the cause of parliament when Ramaphosa also refused to answer questions on his Phala Phala scandal.

Political economy analyst Daniel Silke said the refusals to appear were a manifestation of the ongoing divisions within the ANC.

“The different factions are now building up towards the end of year conference, which actually makes the ANC even more ungovernable,” said Silke.

“The parliamentary standing committees have historically largely supported the party and supported the interests of the cabinet and executive members. One could argue Parliament’s oversight has been lacking for many years and it had really been a feature of the ANC government.”

Ramaphosa not willing to account

Mathekga said it would be unrealistic for citizens to expect Ramaphosa to be enthusiastic about forcing his Cabinet ministers to account when he himself was being belligerent over Phala Phala.

“That he is not willing to open and accounting is worse. It starts from the top; it always works better if you have a president who does not have to answer to this kind of conduct,” Mathekga said.

“That president can stand on principle and try to persuade others to say that in his Cabinet, you have to account,” said Mathekga.

On 8 November, Gungubele informed Standing Committee on Public Accounts (Scopa) chair Mkhuleko Hlengwa in writing that in response to Scopa’s invitation of 25 October, his deputy Zizi Kodwa “will not be able to honour Scopa’s invitation as was previously communicated in his correspondence of 3 November 2022”.

This was, he believed, because they were only accountable over the vetting of Eskom officials “to the Joint Standing Committee on Intelligence (“the JSCI”) as the relevant Parliamentary Committee responsible for overseeing the intelligence, counter-intelligence functions, and the administration of the Services in terms of … the Intelligence Services Oversight Act…”.

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The legal opinion obtained by parliament differed wildly with Gungubele, noting Scopa was “empowered by law to request the update on the vetting of employees of SOEs”.

Silke noted the historical legacy of the reluctance to confront the executive was now merging with the competitive factionalism which was now apparent.

“It therefore follows with members of the executive not willing to follow the full instructions of Parliament. It is a very negative relationship which exists between the oversight aspect of our Constitution and the majority party,” Silke said.

“It doesn’t bode well for holding the executive to account in the very short term but I would argue this is a feature of the general breakdown in consensus within the ANC and the jockeying for position which is apparent.”

Committee ‘extremely disrespected’ by Sisulu

The tourism portfolio committee was supposed to meet with Sisulu to discuss a number of items “including: the Department’s First and Second Quarter Performance Reports for the 2022/23 financial year; the International work done by the Ministry; the process of merger of SA Tourism and Brand South Africa; Introduction of the new Board of South African Tourism and the process followed; and timeframes on the policy review process and reasons for the delays”.

Sisulu was, however, a no-show and after being summonsed by the PPC, has turned to her legal team, even sending a lawyer in her place to attend one of the briefings in her stead.

This did not impress members of the committee.

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Her spokesperson, Steve Motale, would only refer to his statement on behalf of Sisulu which noted she was “unable to respond to any issue related to the summons as the matter is subjudicare (sic)”.

According to the Parliamentary Monitoring Group committee report, Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) PPC member Anthony Matumba said the committee was “extremely disrespected” by Sisulu by sending her counsel to talk to the committee members.

“This country cannot be run like this where people just come in and seek to address the Committee,” said Matumba.

“We are not running a banana republic or a spaza shop” Matumba said.

– Additional reporting by Amanda Watson