PUBLIC PROTECTOR AND PARLIAMENTARY OVERSIGHT
4 May 2015
The Office of the ANC Chief Whip rejects with the contempt it deserves the misguided view amongst the opposition and their collaborators in the media that any criticism of Public Protector Thuli Madonsela amounts to attack of her person and office.
This notion has been peddled in the media since the Public Protector’s appearance before the portfolio committee on justice and correctional service last week, where she accounted on her office’s operations and expenditures. As with many state agencies and government departments that appear before Parliament, difficult questions were asked by MPs in line with parliament oversight function.
Institutions that account to Parliament often face a litany of probing questions aimed at shedding some light on their operational activities, and some are even sent packing if unable to provide satisfactory answers to the legislators. The aim of this oversight exercise is not to embarrass, but to ensure that Parliament intervenes decisively where necessary to ensure that those institutions succeed in line with their founding legislations.
It is regrettable that when it comes to the Public Protector, the opposition and its sycophantic liberal media would want to see Parliament bending the rules, asking sweetheart questions or abandoning its oversight responsibilities altogether. This can only be the thinking of those whose support for the Public Protector is not innocently based on the institution’s excellent work against corruption and malfeasance, but a self-serving and mischievous agenda which views the institution as some potent political pawn against the ANC. Such dishonourable motives, which saw the opposition MPs in that committee falling over themselves to ingratiate themselves to the Public Protector while attempting to block any question from the ANC MPs, only serves to weaken not only the office of the Public Protector but Parliament’s oversight function. No institution is above criticism or parliamentary oversight.