Parliament must commence impeachment proceedings against Jacob Zuma
The Constitutional Court has delivered yet another blow to President Zuma and his keepers. Today, the Constitutional Court ruled that Parliament has violated its constitutional obligation to hold President Zuma to account by failing to determine whether he has breached section 89 of the Constitution. This is a consequence of the ANC capturing Parliament and turning it into a lapdog of the Executive for the sole purpose of consistently protecting Zuma and his corrupt acolytes at all costs.
Parliament’s evolution into another captured arm of Jacob Zuma’s corrupt administration has been championed by the Speaker of the National Assembly, Baleka Mbete. She has consistently been found wanting in several court judgments for failing to fulfil her constitutional duties in order to protect Zuma and the corrupt ANC – this judgment has again made it clear that Baleka Mbete is unfit to serve as Speaker of the National Assembly.
Following today’s judgment, Parliament has been ordered by the Court to comply with its constitutional duties without delay in terms of section 237 and fulfil its obligation to determine whether the President should be impeached. This is a direct result of the Nkandla ruling which found Zuma to have failed to uphold, defend and respect the Constitution as the supreme law in South Africa.
This now requires that Parliament step up and correct its course before it is completely lost. The Democratic Alliance therefore requests that the Speaker attend to the following:
Parliament must earnestly apply itself to the question of whether Baleka Mbete is still fit to hold office as Speaker of the National Assembly in light of the damning judgments against her;
Parliament’s Rules Committee must be ordered to meet as a matter of urgency in order to review Parliament’s Rules and Procedures governing impeachment in order to comply with the judgment of the Constitutional Court and section 237 of the Constitution;
The DA’s motion to impeach Jacob Zuma must be re-tabled as soon as reasonably possible and debated in a manner that is consistent with constitutionally compliant rules devised by the Rules Committee.
It is now the task of Parliament to ensure that the rules governing impeachment do not fall victim to another farcical ANC process in which majoritarian tactics are used to bully the Rules Committee into devising rules designed to absolve Jacob Zuma. The rules devised by the Rules Committee must be constitutionally compliant and the process must be imbued with constitutionality. Accordingly, we request that the Speaker comply with the order of the highest court in South Africa and do the honourable thing – accede to our requests and set Parliament back on course to fulfill its constitutional mandate.
Statement issued by Mmusi Maimane, Leader of the Democratic Alliance, 29 December 2017
