Another Nkandla deadlock looms

Nkandla 26072015 Chicken coup and kraal, President Zuma's home, Nkandla. Photo: Jacques Naude

Nkandla 26072015 Chicken coup and kraal, President Zuma's home, Nkandla. Photo: Jacques Naude

Published Jul 30, 2015

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Cape Town – Parliament’s ad hoc committee mullling the police minister’s report on Nkandla was on Thursday heading for the same deadlock as its previous incarnations as the opposition and ANC MPs clashed over the import of the Public Protector’s findings on the controversy.

Opposition parties pleaded for Thuli Madonsela to be called before the committee to discuss her report, in the same manner that Police Minister Nathi Nhleko was given a chance this week to talk about his report - which directly contradicts hers.

ANC MP Francois Beukman argued that the previous committee dealing with the fallout from a R246 million security upgrade of President Jacob Zuma’s private home in rural KwaZulu-Natal had discussed Madonsela’s damning findings on at least seven occasions.

He went on to cite the Western Cape High Court judgment by Judge Ashton Schippers in which he held that the Chapter 9 institution’s directives were not binding on the State but could not be ignored without rational reasons.

His colleague, ANC veteran Mathole Motshekga, went further, accusing Madonsela of misleading the nation and the opposition of disrespecting the courts by twisting Schippers’s judgment to suit their own ends.

“The report of the Public Protector is misleading and misled the nation. It was clear: we were not at or in an amphitheatre. So whatever she said about an amphitheatre falls away, and we went to the pool … and there is nobody who could say the use of the water is irrational or illogical,” he said, referring to the committee’s visit to Zuma’s homestead last week, where officials reiterated that the swimming pool doubles up as a reservoir for fire-fighting.

Motshekga reiterated that the project had entailed a large-scale waste of public funds, but said this could not be laid at the president’s door.

“Deal with the people who built the kraal, not the person for whom the kraal was built. Why even mention the president?” he asked.

Democratic Alliance chief whip John Steenhuisen said he had come to the committee with an open mind but was saddened to observe that “all political parties are retreating back into the laager”.

He said the stand-off could be termed “a tale of two reports” — that of Madonsela who found that Zuma had benefited unduly from the work on his property and should refund the State for luxuries, and that of Police Minister Nathi Nhleko who found that all contested features in fact served a security purpose and therefore Zuma did not have to pay back a cent.

“This is a sore on the political body of South Africa,” he said.

“It bedevills everything else we do.”

Agang-SA’s Andries Tlouamma said the arguments advanced by ANC MPs were so illogical that they seemed the stuff of “witchcraft”.

“It seems that the ruling party is hell-bent that our president survives this one as well…. I am very worried that by participating here I am actually helping in serving the Public Protector’s head on a platter, she is being sacrificed here.

“This is truly an abuse of power, so I want to add my voice that the Public Protector should come here.”

ANC MPs, however, dug in their heels and called for the committee to proceed to write its final report to the National Assembly.

Last year, opposition parties walked out of the ad hoc committee dealing with various reports on Nkandla and Zuma’s response to those, mainly in protest at the ruling party’s refusal to agree that the Public Protector’s reports were binding on the executive, or at least solicit independent legal opinion on their status.

It has become a burning political issue, underscored by Schippers himself in recent judgment in the SABC case in which he granted the public broadcaster leave to appeal, noting that it had little chance of success but that it was imperative that the Supreme Court of Appeal pronounce on the weight of the Public Protector’s findings.

ANA

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