Ministers here as ‘servants of the people’

Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa has defended cabinet ministers against opposition claims that they were treating parliament with disdain by not availing themselves to respond to oral questions from MPs.

Speaking during question time in the National Assembly yesterday, Ramaphosa said ministers were hardworking “servants of the people” who did not feel entitled to positions they hold, as opposition MPs had earlier suggested.

“They see themselves as servants of the people. They are there because they don’t necessarily wish to be there, they were appointed to be servants of the people, they were appointed to work for the people. Having come from the private sector, I have found a great deal of commitment amongst my colleagues on the executive. I have found that they work extremely hard, they are totally committed to their tasks, they are smart, they know what they’re talking about,” said Ramaphosa.

He reiterated that disrespectful behaviour on the part of the some opposition benches had also prevented ministers from answering questions.

Agang SA MP Molapi Plouamma had asked the deputy president if he kept a record of ministers’ attendance of questions and answers sessions.

Ramaphosa said the attendance register was available on the public record.

Since the fifth parliament convened in June this year, opposition parties have been complaining that several ministers were repeatedly snubbing sessions to take oral questions in the National Assembly for unsound reasons.

Tlounama claimed this suggested that ministers did not understand their constitutional obligations.

COPE MP Willi Madisha asked Ramaphosa if he would take steps against a culture of ministers “supplying non-answers” and delaying responses to questions for “weeks on end”.

Ramaphosa said it was up to MPs to ask more pointed follow-up questions if they were unhappy with answers from ministers.

“If a question had been asked and an unsatisfactory answer is given, it behoves on the questioner to ask for a more direct answer.

“It may seem like people delay, but quite often ministers, in between many other things that they do, also have to gather information and some of the questions are quite intricate and they involve having ministers to get information from the officials,” said Ramaphosa.

“I have seen many of our ministers, if not all, truly at work, committed to answering questions and I see in the record that I evaluate on an ongoing basis.”