Cape Town - Speaker Baleka Mbete is ready to throw the rule book at the EFF if it pursues the presidential oral replies – abandoned amid the “pay back the money” fracas – at next month’s State of the Nation address as such conduct “potentially constitutes intimidation”.
This emerged from her response on Tuesday to EFF leader Julius Malema’s request for a special sitting to complete the question session before the February 12 opening of Parliament.
In it, he said: “Please note that failure to accommodate our request will give us no other option but to insist that President Jacob Zuma answer the questions at the State of the Nation address.”
Declining the need for a special sitting, Mbete said the proposed conduct could contravene the 2004 Powers, Privileges and Immunities of Parliament and Provincial Legislatures Act – the same law that was the basis for disciplinary proceedings leading to guilty verdicts against 20 EFF MPs for their “pay back the money” protest, although a subsequent court interdict set this aside.
“I would urge you to desist from such conduct and instead engage constructively in processing matters relating to the function of the (National) Assembly,” wrote Mbete. “I am confident that the processes of consultation under way on issues of questions will yield a positive outcome.”
Mbete told Malema her office and the Presidency were in consultations regarding oral questions to the president, but ultimately this was a matter for the programming committee. “…there is no reason to convene a sitting of the National Assembly before 12 February as requested,” wrote Mbete.
However, indications are the EFF was unlikely to compromise.
Party secretary-general Godrich Gardee, according to Sapa, told reporters that in 2015 the party “will make sure that Jacob Zuma pays back the money as instructed by remedial actions of the public protector”.
“We are not being disruptive… (Zuma) proved that he doesn’t take Parliament seriously,” Gardee is quoted as saying.
Malema’s letter has opened the door for the continuation of tense and chaotic times which characterised the national legislature late last year.
Then opposition parties formed a united front amid criticism Zuma was thumbing his nose at the national legislature by refusing to answer questions as required by parliamentary rules at least once a term, of which there were three in the post-May 2014 elections Parliament.
The Presidency has dismissed this and pointed out Zuma had appeared four times in Parliament, including delivering the 2014 State of the Nation address, responding to the subsequent parliamentary debate and delivering the annual National Council of Provinces (NCOP) address.
The ANC has repeatedly blamed the EFF, and other opposition parties, for the unfinished question session on August 21 last year.
In Tuesday’s letter Mbete, who is also the ANC’s national chairwoman, reiterated this: “He (Zuma) was prevented from completing the session due to disruptions in the House”.
The ANC in Parliament faces a potential pickle, not only over potential disruptions of the State of the Nation address, but also over future presidential question slots.
Parliamentary rules state when such a slot is disrupted, the next one must pick up from where the last one ended.
Effectively, this means Zuma would still have to answer the EFF’s question on an exact time and date on which he’d repay at least some of the R215 million taxpayer-funded security up-grades at his rural Nkandla homestead.
In March last year, the public protector found Zuma had “unduly” benefited and should repay at least some of the money for benefits like the cattle kraal and swimming pool.
Political Bureau