Sizani lashes ‘disdainful’ Madonsela

THE ANC caucus has shouted down public protector Thuli Madonsela, accusing her of being “condescending” to parliament and President Jacob Zuma’s cabinet ministers.

The ANC caucus has also come out guns blazing against the DA, saying their call for MPs to reconvene from their recess to deal with their request for an ad hoc committee to set up to start impeachment proceeding against Zuma was “extremely arrogant”.

Madonsela last week found that R246-million of public funds had been used to upgrade Zuma’s private home Nkandla and that the president and his family had improperly benefited from the expenditure.

Stone Sizani, the ANC chief whip in parliament, said yesterday his party was not impressed by Madonsela’s recent comments about the independence of parliament’s justice committee and an inter-ministerial committee which did a cabinet investigation into the upgrade of Zuma’s Nkandla homestead.

“Following the release of her report, the public protector disdainfully referred to the “inter-ministerial task team which investigated the upgrades as a ‘little committee of ministers’,” he said.

In an interview with the Sunday Times, Madonsela made damaging comments against parliament’s portfolio committee on justice, suggesting the oversight body she reports to should not be trusted with protecting the office of the public protector against political attacks.

Madonsela said the process of impeaching heads of an office similar to hers should be taken away from MPs and transferred to the Judicial Services Commission. She has previously had public spats with the justice committee over her powers to determine issues to be probed by her office.

“She has also spoken condescendingly of parliament, a constitutional institution that she is accountable to, by questioning its independence and suggesting that some of its powers – such as the power to appoint or impeach the president be clipped … all these remarks contain political overtones that are unacceptable coming from the head of an independent Chapter 9 institution. By making such disparaging remarks against two arms of state … we strongly believe that she has overstepped the mark,” said Sizani.

Turning to the DA push for Zuma to be kicked-out of the Union Buildings, Sizani said the National Assembly was not in a position to deal with the public protector’s report against Zuma as she had not tabled it before parliament.

He made it clear the ANC would block any attempt to have Zuma ejected from the highest office in the land.

Sizani, said the DA move to impeach Zuma from office was based a misinterpretation of Madonsela’s report.

“It would be absolutely unthinkable for a constitutional institution such as parliament to initiate proceedings against a sitting president on the basis of one party’s faulty opinion on a report of a Chapter 9 institution,” he said.

Although she released the report to the public last week, Madonsela has not yet tabled it to parliament, saying she would allow Zuma to submit it together with his comments on her report.

But the DA has stuck to its guns, saying only the speaker of the National Assembly Max Sisulu had the final say on proposed impeachment proceedings against Zuma.

“I suspect Sizani’s sudden urge to react to the issue after a full week of silence has perhaps been brought on by the letter released by the speaker on Tuesday noting that he is in fact considering the DA request for the motion to initiate impeachment proceedings.

“The DA remains resolute in our efforts to ensure all those responsible – including President Zuma – are held to account,” said DA caucus chairman Wilmot James.