Zuma, ANC stifling debate: Cope

Cope spokesman Dennis Bloem says President Zuma and the ANC are stifling debate in Parliament. File picture: Paballo Thekiso

Cope spokesman Dennis Bloem says President Zuma and the ANC are stifling debate in Parliament. File picture: Paballo Thekiso

Published Oct 10, 2015

Share

Cape Town – The African National Congress has stifled debate in Parliament, resulting in “undisguised majoritarianism” and forcing court challenges, the Congress of the People said on Saturday.

“President (Jacob) Zuma knows how to twist both reality and the facts. His contention that there is no longer a political debate is quite true,” Cope spokesman Dennis Bloem said in a statement.

“The ANC, willfully and deliberately, has stifled debate in parliament. Undisguised majoritarianism prevails as the new norm. The ANC listens to nobody and interrogates nothing. It rams what it wants through Parliament. Debate has become futile. The empty galleries in Parliament attest to the absence of debate. The inclusivity and mutuality of the early years has dissipated,” he said.

Zuma’s assertion that opposition parties run to court at the wink of an eye was an extreme exaggeration. Parties went to court as a last resort to get the ANC to do the right thing. It continued to stray from the constitutional path and that was why opposition parties continued to challenge it.

Bloem said opposition parties certainly did not have a “crooked understanding” of the constitutional dispensation.

“That crookedness of understanding belongs to Zuma alone. History will reflect that from 2009 many parties were forced to go to court to attack the encroachment by the ANC on our constitutional gains. This will stand as a permanent a blemish on the ruling party’s record,” he said.

“If only Zuma knew how many ANC members in private applaud the opposition parties for defending the gains of democracy in court. Because the party imposes three-line whips on its members, they are dragooned to vote with the party. If the party permitted members to vote according to their conscience, he would have long ridden into the sunset with Speaker (Baleka) Mbete close behind.”

The ANC was stultifying debate and choking parliamentary democracy. It was there for all to see. This was not something opposition parties were making up.

“Cope strongly believes that political parties in opposition have a right and a duty to invoke the Constitution. The Constitution is after all the supreme law of our country. The ANC led by President Zuma, however, undermines the Constitution. Opposition parties have no recourse but to file challenges in court to defend the Constitution. Never once has President Zuma done anything to actively advance or defend the Constitution. That says something about his deep antipathy to the Constitution,” Bloem said.

In his speech to the ANC national general council (NGC) in Midrand, Johannesburg, on Friday, Zuma overtly gave support to the objective of the SA Communist Party to establish a “dictatorship of the proletariat”. In effect, this would overthrow the Constitution. Zuma went on to declare that even the ANC’s “objectives are facing the same direction”.

“We understand the acute danger our constitutional democracy is facing and that is why Cope and other parties have to stop Zuma and (SACP general secretary Blade) Nzimande from establishing the dictatorship of the proletariat at the expense of democracy and the Constitution.

“If President Zuma zealously upholds the Constitution and acts as its foremost champion, no opposition party will ever have to go to court again to challenge the ANC. Why would they? The ball is in his court,” said Bloem.

African News Agency

Related Topics: