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- Several EFF MPs will appear before Parliament’s Powers and Privileges Committee for disrupting this year’s state of the nation address.
- Some EFF MPs will also face disciplinary action after they stormed onto the stage as Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan delivered his budget vote last year.
- Committee chair Philly Mapulane said the MPs involved would have to comment on the charges against them.
Frivolous order points and misbehavior have returned to haunt the EFF, as its MPs have to answer for disrupting the State of the Nation Address (SONA) by the presence of former President FW De Klerk and an attack on the Minister of Public Enterprises, Pravin Gordhan.
On Tuesday, Parliament’s powers and privileges committee met to deliberate on legal opinion on SONA’s February halt.
Committee chair Philly Mapulane said they had sought legal opinion on the matter, but no initiator had yet been appointed.
“The legal opinion was to raise two questions. The first was whether we have jurisdiction to consider the referral of the President of the incident that occurred. The opinion says that this committee has the jurisdiction to consider the matter and reach a conclusion for or against. .
“All that has to happen is that the committee must allow the process to identify those against whom there are problems and charges that [be] brought. They also need to be allowed to make representations and on the basis of the representations the committee can decide whether [to] Proceed or not, “Mapulane said.
EFF MPs delayed President Cyril Ramaphosa’s start of SONA by more than an hour as they objected to the presence of De Klerk, who was in the public rostrum.
In part, leader Julius Malema objected to Parliament extending an invitation to De Klerk and referred to him as a murderer.
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EFF deputy Mbuyiseni Ndlozi asked the committee to abandon the process. He said there were no legal grounds to hear a complaint that treated members of Parliament “as a group of a political party.”
He said:
“The people of South Africa have decided that the EFF should be in that Parliament and once they are there we should be referred to a member [committee]. The Law of Power and Privileges has no jurisdiction over a political party, there is no such thing. It is fundamentally wrong. You can put anybody through a procedure, but what we should be entertaining is member X who has been brought in and brought to us because the Speaker says this is what he raped. Then we investigate whether that person has indeed violated acts. That person must come and respond. “
“Even in the video you will see them doing what? We are going to have to decide that they are breaking what rule … that cannot be justice. You cannot be the investigator and the judge,” Ndlozi. additional.
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Mapulane said it was premature to abandon the process, as the legal opinion clarified the committee’s jurisdiction on the matter.
“The committee is satisfied with the opinion. Then we must move forward to address the merits of what happened on SONA day. The only way forward is for us to identify those members and ask them to make representations about the charges that will be brought before them. them, “he said.
On the incident involving Gordhan, the committee heard that an initiator had been appointed.
In July last year, around 20 MPs stormed the stage as Gordhan delivered his budget speech.
The committee had yet to establish a procedural schedule.
It is not the first time that EFF deputies have been referred to the committee on powers and privileges.
In 2014, a group of MPs was indicted after shouting “return the money” during a question and answer session with former President Jacob Zuma.
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