ANC MPs have learnt nothing from the Zuma nightmare
● If the events that unfolded in the National Assembly recently are anything to go by, it would not be incorrect to conclude that ANC MPs have learnt nothing from the ruinous Jacob Zuma era.
During Zuma’s tenure, ANC legislators and ministers fell over themselves defending him over the Nkandla scandal, turning a parliamentary probe on the matter into a sham by heckling opposition MPs each time they questioned him on the issue.
You could not help but recall that terrible time on Tuesday while watching the National Assembly sitting at which President Cyril Ramaphosa appeared to answer MPs’ oral questions.
The elephant, or perhaps the Ankole, in the room was the scandal in which millions of dollars in cash were stolen from his Bela Bela game farm Phala Phala in 2020, only for the crime to be concealed until it was scandalously revealed by his rival and former spy boss Arthur Fraser.
As he took to the virtual podium to respond to the six questions that had been put to him, opposition parties, mainly the EFF, immediately objected, insisting that he address the burglary at Phala Phala first despite it being the fifth item on the question paper.
Whether Julius Malema and his MPs were right in their behaviour is a debate for another day.
What was troubling was how ANC MPs were quick to defend their president’s reluctance to be held accountable on Phala Phala as he later told the National Assembly that he had been advised by his lawyers not to entertain parliamentary questions on the matter because law enforcement agencies were still investigating.
It was disappointing to watch.
You would have hoped that ANC MPs had by now internalised the Constitutional Court’s 2016 Nkandla judgment about the role of elected public representatives in holding the president and his executive to account without fear or favour.
But perhaps that’s expecting too much from the ANC, where party loyalty trumps ethics and principles.
The president’s refusal to respond to a parliamentary question, citing legal advice, is also worrying. It undermines the National Assembly’s constitutional obligation to hold him accountable and renders parliament toothless and pointless.
The president cannot be happy to answer questions if they come from the public protector and other law enforcement agencies, but not if they come from the very institution that elected him to office.
It’s conduct tantamount to that of a suspect who refuses to answer questions from the police unless their lawyer is present.
If ANC MPs continue to spur him on, parliament will remain as chaotic as it was in the Zuma years, with key policy and developmental issues relegated to the back burner.