MPs to Zoom back into assembly action
The National Assembly will have to overcome logistical challenges to enable 400 MPs to participate in a three-hour question and answer session with ministers in the social service and governance cluster on Wednesday.
It will be the first sitting of the house since it went into recess in March ahead of the lockdown under the National Disaster Management Act to curb the spread of the new coronavirus, and most MPs will participate virtually in the hybrid meeting.
The questions to be posed to ministers relate to what the various departments have been doing to deal with the Covid-19 pandemic and its effects on communities. Questions have been asked of the ministers of health; higher and basic education; human settlements, water & sanitation; public service & administration; and co-operative governance & traditional affairs, among others.
The EFF proposal that parliament move temporarily to Gauteng to enable more MPs to physically attend the sitting was shot down on Thursday by speaker of the National Assembly Thandi Modise at a meeting of the National Assembly programming committee.
It was decided that the leaders of political parties will indicate which of their MPs will be able to be present physically on Wednesday. The chief whip’s forum decided that 50 MPs be allowed to physically attend, however no fixed number was decided on by Modise.
Seating of MPs in the assembly hall will have to take account of the need for social distancing.
As the lockdown prohibits interprovincial movement, only MPs based in Cape Town will be able to be physically present.
Modise said she had sought legal advice about whether MPs were able to move interprovincially under the lockdown regulations and had also asked this of the national coronavirus command council.
Zoom will be used for virtual participants of the sitting as the platform allows for 500 people, whereas parliament’s licence with Microsoft Teams only permits 250. The sitting will also be broadcast live on the parliamentary channel on TV.
EFF MP Veronica Mente suggested that parliament be moved to Gauteng because so few MPs are based in Cape Town and because the city is the epicentre of the pandemic. The Powers, Privileges and Immunities of Parliament and Provincial Legislatures Act allows the presiding officers to designate any precinct in SA as the site of parliament.
Modise stressed that parliament would be opened incrementally, and not all staff and MPs would be allowed to return at once.