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Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula, the Speaker of the National Assembly, rejected the African Transformation Movement’s (ATM) request for a secret ballot vote to adopt or reject the Section 89 report on the Phala Phala scandal.
According to the report, there is prima facie evidence that President Cyril Ramaphosa violated his oath of office and broke anti-corruption laws after millions of rands were stolen from his game farm in 2020.
The report will be debated in the National Assembly on Tuesday, December 6, and if it is adopted, the President will face an impeachment investigation.
On December 1, ATM President Vuyo Zungula wrote to the Speaker, requesting that she consider allowing MPs to vote by secret ballot following the debate.
The Speaker says that she believed that a closed voting procedure would deprive citizens of learning about the positions of their parliamentary representatives.
A secret vote, according to Mapisa-Nqakula, “may facilitate the possibility of corruption aimed at influencing members to vote in a manner that shields them from accountability to the people they represent for the exercise of their constitutional duty.”
The ANC National Working Committee (NWC), according to reports, decided that the official party line for MPs on Tuesday would be to reject the report.
President Cyril Ramaphosa was on the verge of resigning last week. After some consideration, it appears that he will challenge the report in court.
On Monday, it was also revealed that Siviwe Gwarube, Chief Whip of the Democratic Alliance (DA), had rejected the Speaker’s decision not to use a roll-call voting system on Tuesday.
Before voting for or against the motion, each MP would be called by name under the roll-call system.
The method was rejected by the Speaker because it is time-consuming. She also mentioned potential connectivity issues with the virtual platform for MPs.
“Mapisa-Nqakula also declined the ATM’s request for a secret ballot. As things stand, MPs will vote by the usual method for hybrid sittings: each party’s whip will announce how many members they have present and whether they vote for or against the motion or abstain.
“If a member votes differently from their party, they have to announce this,” said Gwarube.