PRESIDENT Cyril Ramaphosa and his Cabinet will face a no-confidence motion at the end of March, National Assembly speaker Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula confirmed the date on Thursday.
On March 30, the National Assembly will also debate his cabinet’s fitness.
The DA tabled the motion in February following his State of the Nation Address.
Mapisa-Nqakula said members of Parliament will vote in an open ballot.
“Both motions will be voted openly, on the 30th of March when we conduct these motions voting will be open, which will make things easy for our chief whips and for all parties,” said Mapisa-Nqakula.
“I have granted the ATM reasons why I believe that it would be in the interest of transparency and our democracy in Parliament that we exercise this freedom openly.”
The ANC chief whip Pemmy Majodina said the majority party is happy with an open ballot.
“I don’t remember us using secret vote when processing the issue on the public protector. I voted on behalf of my party. We support for both motions to be voted openly as per the rules of hybrid,” said Majodina.
The DA’s deputy chief whip Siviwe Gwarube said they believe those sitting in cabinet should not take part in the voting process.
“It makes absolutely no sense speaker to us that the cabinet whose futures are on the line must vote for themselves in a motion that concerns themselves and through the whip in Parliament. It makes no sense for a constitutional motion of this kind as serious as this to allow the whips to be in control of voting mechanisms,” said Gwarube.
The DA singled out Tourism minister Lindiwe Sisulu as as a huge liability in government, saying she must be the first Cabinet minister to to be shown the door by Ramaphosa.
“When she was still the Minister of Human Settlements, Sisulu established National Rapid Response Task Teams (NRRTTs) that were staffed by individuals such as ex Fees Must Fall leader, Chumane Maxwele; ex PAC leader, Thami Ka Plaatjie; and ex COPE Regional leader, Mbulelo Ncedana,” said the party’s Shadow Minister of Tourism, Manny de Freitas.
“Between March 2019 and the announcement of the State of Disaster in 2020, the Water and Sanitation NRRTT alone billed the almost bankrupt Department of Water and Sanitation over R3.7 million in travel and accommodation expenses. A former aide to Sisulu, Mphumzi Mdekazi, claimed more than R1.76 million on travel and accommodation since May 2019. This was in addition to the already hyper-inflated monthly salary of R142 920 that he received as an Advisory Committee Member for 15 days of work a month.”
She added: “The only lives Minister Sisulu has bettered are her own and those of her comrades and cronies. Her decades as Minister in various capacities shows a calculating callousness towards South Africans, and Minister Sisulu cannot be allowed to milk taxpayers to further her own enrichment and agenda any longer.”
De Freitas said the the tourism industry was one of the hardest hit sectors by the disruptions brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic and it is still struggling to regain lost footing, and requires a hands-on minister with a clear plan on how to revive the sector.
“However, since her appointment Minister Sisulu has been missing in action. Tourism players have waited in vain for government support to revive their operations and the Minister has missed a number of committee meetings in Parliament to account for her performance,” said de Freitas.
“The tourism sector is a big economic driver for South Africa and the fact that Minister Sisulu is absent shows she either does not understand this, or simply do not care about ordinary South Africans struggling to survive.”
- Inside Politics
