The section 89 report which found President Cyril Ramaphosa has a case to answer is formally before parliament’s impeachment committee.
The report stems from an independent panel’s findings into the Phala Phala matter which concluded Ramaphosa may have a case to answer for potential constitutional breaches.
The 31-member committee is made up of representatives from 16 of the 18 political parties in parliament. The GOOD Party and the Pan Africanist Congress of Azania have indicated they will not participate as each party has only one member of parliament who also serves in the executive. The committee elected Rise Mzansi’s Makashule Gana as its chairperson this week.
The committee was officially announced last Monday, marking the formal start of the impeachment process. It will determine its programme of work and next steps in the process.
On Thursday the subcommittee on the review of Assembly Rules met with parliament’s legal advisers to review the rules and guidelines governing the section 89 process.
The subcommittee’s review was aimed at ensuring consistency with the Constitutional Court’s judgment in the EFF matter relating to the presidential impeachment process. This included:
- making technical corrections to ensure consistent language throughout the rules;
- aligning them with the outcome of the court proceedings; and
- ensuring overall coherence with the impeachment process as it currently stands following the judgment.
The revised rules will be submitted to the rules committee for formal adoption, with the subcommittee on the review of the Assembly Rules also set to seek further legal opinion. The rules committee is expected to meet next Tuesday.
National Assembly secretary Masibulele Xaso confirmed: “The report has been referred to the impeachment [section 89] committee.”
Ramaphosa approached the Western Cape High Court last week, after the establishment of the impeachment committee, seeking to have the report reviewed and set aside, describing it as “flawed”. The president has made it clear he will not resign after the critical ConCourt judgment.
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