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The ANC in Parliament is sorry that it was found to have acted inconsistently with the Constitution, new ANC chief whip Jackson Mthembu said on Wednesday.
He also conceded that the ANC may have been “blindsided” when dealing with the Nkandla matter. “This is something that we must reflect on,” he said.
“We are sorry. We were under the impression that we were correct,” he said at a media briefing that was held a day after a failed motion by the opposition to remove the president in the National Assembly.
Mthembu said the Constitutional Court ruling raised questions about the conduct of Parliament.
“The question is should we on our own not have been aware? … In this instance, we were found wanting. We must look at what made us to be found wanting to the extent that a resolution of the house is set aside by the Constitutional Court.”
He said that the ANC members needed to also ask whether the party had conflated the role of the executive and Parliament. “This is something we must look at critically.”
Mthembu said when Police Minister Nathi Nhleko “started playing bioscopes”, ANC MPs should have asked him whether his report would stand up in court.
Nhleko’s report exonerated Zuma and led to the resolution being passed in the National Assembly.
In its damning judgment, the Constitutional Court ordered that the resolution was inconsistent with the Constitution, was invalid and was thus set aside.
“All we know is that we have learnt from this judgment,” said Mthembu.
But he defended the ANC’s unanimous vote against the motion during Tuesday’s sitting and denied accusations that caucus members were “sycophants”. While the court had found the president had acted inconsistently with the Constitution, it was not deliberate or malicious, and it did not amount to a “serious violation”, which would warrant removal.
He said the president has apologised.
“We must now implement the remedial actions as outlined in the Public Protector’s report,” said Mthembu.
He said that the court had acknowledged that the president “might have been following wrong legal advice and therefore acting in good faith”.
“Also important to note is the fact that, before the Constitutional Court declared conclusively that the Public Protector’s remedial actions are binding, lower courts had held different opinions on the matter.”
Mthembu said both the president and Parliament “have accepted and expressly committed themselves to implement all the orders of the Constitutional Court without reservations”.
