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The Nkandla scandal moves to Parliament today amid growing calls for President Jacob Zuma to resign.
A motion for the removal of Zuma in terms of article 89 of the Constitution will be given top priority in the National Assembly after initially being the last item on the agenda.
Members of Parliament, who return to the National Assembly today after a recess, will vote on the motion, which was submitted by Democratic Alliance leader Mmusi Maimane.
Fireworks are expected right from the beginning if parliamentary speaker Baleka Mbete is the presiding officer.
If Mbete is in the chair for the motion, “we will take a point of order”, said DA chief whip John Steenhuisen.
He said it was “inappropriate” for Mbete to preside over “this constitutional issue in which her impartiality is in question”.
He said whichever way the vote went, “it will be a watershed moment for Parliament and the president, with electoral consequences. If the ANC supports Zuma, they do so over the Constitution. They will become one with Zuma and will have to ride out the consequences.”
The Economic Freedom Fighters confirmed through its spokesperson Mbuyiseni Ndlozi that the party would be in the National Assembly and participate in the vote to remove the president.
All indications were that the ANC would close ranks around Zuma and will not let the opposition get the upper hand.
The vote came after the Constitutional Court ruling on Nkandla, which found that Zuma failed to “respect, support and defend the Constitution” when he did not comply with Public Protector Thuli Madonsela’s recommendations on the matter. Madonsela found that Zuma “unduly benefited” from upgrades to his private Nkandla residence in KwaZulu-Natal, and she recommended that he pay back the money spent on the upgrades that were not related to security.
The court also found that Parliament had acted inconsistently with the Constitution over its handling of the Nkandla saga.
The South African Communist Party has said that “decisive action is necessary” in the light of the judgment and that the ANC had to do “soul-searching”.
The question now is whether SACP leaders such as Higher Education Minister Blade Nzimande, Trade and Industry Minister Rob Davies and ANC member of Parliament Yunus Carrim will attend the sitting.
The ANC’s top leadership met until late last night with the party’s national working committee and members of the national executive committee meeting to discuss the court ruling. The meeting took place in a hotel in Bantry Bay.
ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe would meet with the 249 ANC MPs today, just hours before the motion to vote.
The ANC has always used its majority to quash motions from the opposition parties.
The opposition has called on ANC MPs to vote according to their conscience, but ANC parliamentary spokesperson Moloto Mothapo dismissed the call as “hypocritical”.
No member of any political party has ever voted differently from their party line, even those opposition parties calling for ANC MPs to vote “in line with their conscience”.
“Their members will be voting no differently from a decision of the party, so why they expect ANC MPs to do so is beyond comprehension. The last thing we would do is take advice from our detractors,” said Mothapo.
Denying there were any divisions in the caucus, he confirmed that the caucus meeting in the morning would include the afternoon’s programme of the house.
He would not pre-empt the outcome of the vote.
“The motion will be debated and then voting will take place, so our feelings will be made known at that debate.”
Mothapo agreed with parliamentary presiding officers who on the weekend said they didn’t owe the Public Protector an apology for conduct that the Constitutional Court found was inconsistent with the Constitution.
“We should personalise serious matters of a constitutional nature. There was no deliberate intention to operate inconsistently with the Constitution. When guidance is given from the court, we welcome it and act on it.”
