Cape Town - Speaker of the Cape Town council, Felicity Purchase, said she did not know that the law enforcement officer she requested to remove EFF chief-whip Banzi Dambuza was armed.
Last week, chaos erupted during the second council meeting of the City of Cape Town when Dambuza was manhandled by law enforcement after he refused to sit down. Council members were debating the adoption of the planning process for the drafting of the new term of Office Integrated Development (IDP).
The speaker erroneously recorded EFF votes on the matter, and their chief whip was having none of it.
“After repeatedly requesting the Councillor to record his party’s vote on the item at hand, and thereafter repeatedly requesting that he take his seat, I requested the VIP and Law Enforcement to remove the councillor from the chamber, as per the Rules of Order,” explained Purchase.
Officers entered the council, and a law enforcement officer was seen with a service firearm and continuously reaching for it while he tried booting out Dambuza. The officer did not draw his firearm during the chaos. Purchase as the speaker has no authority to call officers in, only the municipal manager can do this.
Section 29.1 of the rules only permit an unarmed peace officer from being directed by the City Manager (not the Speaker) to remove a member from Council.
“I was not aware that the Officer in question had a firearm in his possession, nor did I request someone with a firearm to remove the councillor,” said Purchase. “Any response regarding the presence of a firearm, and whether or not the Officer acted unlawfully in this regard, should be referred to the City Manager, who is the relevant authority as Head of the Administration for investigation.”
EFF Cape Metro spokesperson Andiswa Madikazi said they would not let the matter go unchallenged.
“The EFF calls on the speaker to explain the rule/s that she used to bring in someone with live ammunition in the chamber and for her to be fully investigated for her conduct during the session to determine whether there was a breach of any rules on the side of the speaker.”
Suzette Little from Good said calling law enforcement into the chambers was totally unnecessary: “The Speaker simply needed to listen and record the position of each party on the agenda item, as is provided for in the Rules of Council.”
“If the Law Enforcement Officer was armed, then this is a breach of rule 29 of the Rules of Order. The City Manager must investigate if the Law Enforcement Officer/s were armed; since in terms of rule 29.1, the City Manager may only “direct an unarmed designated peace officer(s) to remove” a member of the Council.”
Sandra Dickson from lobby group STOP CoCT blamed the rushing to vote on items before they were thoroughly debated. “The current practice of the council speaker to quickly take a ’vote’ by glancing at councillors is depriving the public of having proper insight into what decisions are taken. These are decisions on policies and by-laws that will affect the very public on whose behalf these decisions are made.
“If current agendas are too long with too many items, more time must simply be allowed for council meetings. Though the previous council meeting lasted just over four hours.”
Weekend Argus