Parliamentary rules don’t allow secret ballot, Mbete tells Consitutional Court

PARLIAMENT’S Speaker Baleka Mbete yesterday filed heads of argument to the Constitutional Court and insisted that parliamentary rules did not make provision for a secret ballot after a motion of no confidence.

Mbete said she was personally not opposed to the notion of a secret ballot but the legislature had considered the issue in the past and elected not to provide for it.

“The collective majority of the National Assembly rejected the proposal,” she said.

The Constitutional Court has been asked by the United Democratic Movement to rule that the constitution obliged, or alternatively permitted, MPs to cast a secret ballot when voting on a motion of no confidence in President Jacob Zuma.

The UDM filed the application after the DA tabled its fifth motion of no confidence in Zuma after he reshuffled the cabinet last month and removed Pravin Gordhan as finance minister.

A debate on the motion was scheduled for April 18, but has been postponed pending the outcome of the court application.

Mbete argued in her submission that should the court hold that the rules of Parliament were unconstitutional in this regard, the matter should be referred back to her office with an order to amend the rules.

The IFP and the EFF have thrown their weight behind the UDM’s application.

The opposition parties want ANC MPs to be allowed to vote according to conscience.

EFF leader Julius Malema has said the opposition would need 70 ANC MPs to break ranks and back the motion for it to succeed and result in Zuma’s removal from office.

ANC chief whip Jackson Mthembu has made it clear that the ruling party’s MPs will be expected to toe the line and vote down the motion.

For mer president Kgalema Motlanthe has publicly differed, saying that as elected public representatives the first duty of MPs was not ANC loyalty and those who defied the party whip should not be sanctioned. – ANA