By Lebone Rodah Mosima
Democratic Alliance MP Dean Macpherson has accused ActionSA of ignoring a dismissed claim that he called its supporters “hobos” and defended his decision to challenge Parliament’s Ethics Committee finding against him in court.
Macpherson’s comments came after ActionSA accused him of trying to avoid accountability by taking the findings of Parliament’s Joint Committee on Ethics and Members’ Interests on review.
The dispute stems from a finding that Macpherson breached the MPs’ Code of Ethical Conduct after referring to ActionSA supporters as “amaphara” outside the Pietermaritzburg High Court on 24 July 2025.
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The committee found the remark to be derogatory and discriminatory, and recommended that Macpherson be reprimanded in the National Assembly and apologise in the House.
The National Assembly adopted the committee’s report on 11 June 2026, with the DA dissenting.
Macpherson said on Wednesday that he rejected ActionSA’s “deliberately malicious and politically motivated accusations” over his decision to challenge the finding.
He said the review was based on what he alleged were serious procedural and constitutional flaws in the committee’s handling of the complaint.
These included, according to Macpherson, the committee’s alleged failure to follow its own rules, its refusal to allow him to make oral representations, the introduction of evidence without giving him an opportunity to respond, the failure to notify him of a minority view, the failure to publish that minority view in the Announcements, Tablings and Committee Reports, and what he said was an attempt to police lawful political speech made outside Parliament.
“At each step, the Ethics Committee did not follow their own rules,” he said.
Macpherson also pointed to another part of the complaint, in which ActionSA MP Alan Beesley had alleged in an affidavit that Macpherson used the word “hobos”.
The committee did not sustain that part of the complaint, finding that the word appeared in a media report but was not shown to have been used by Macpherson.
“However, what Action South Africa fails to answer is that Mr Alan Beesley’s own claim in a legally deposed affidavit that I called people “hobos” was dismissed by the Committee.”
Macpherson said an MP had made a claim in a legally binding affidavit which the Committee did not accept as true, but that the Committee had not properly considered the seriousness of that issue.
He further argued that a knowingly false statement made under oath may amount to perjury, which is a criminal offence.
“It is therefore deeply concerning that, having read the court papers, Action South Africa has no view on Mr Beesley’s alleged false affidavit,” he said.
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Macpherson said he had taken the committee’s findings on review because, in his view, the committee did not follow the process set out in the Code of Ethical Conduct, and because Parliament had no right to police the speech of MPs outside Parliament.
He also alleged that the committee altered the charges midway through the process and introduced evidence without consulting him for a response.
“The Committee refused to allow me to make oral representations to it, which is unlawful,” he said.
“I notified the Speaker of these deficiencies in the process, she should have referred the matter back to the Committee but chose not to. Alternatively, she should have notified the National Assembly of my objection, which she also chose not to do.”
Macpherson said the National Assembly was therefore not properly empowered to make a fully informed decision when it adopted the Committee report.
He said ActionSA was wrong to characterise the review as an attempt to evade accountability, arguing that the case was about due process, the rule of law and the right to freedom of speech.
“While this might not be to the liking of a party like ActionSA, they will one day be grateful that I stood up even for their rights,” he said.
“It is clear that ActionSA and Mr Beesley, who claim to be champions of the Constitution, seek to use the Ethics Committee to violate that very same Constitution in pursuit of political agendas.”
Macpherson said the courts would now decide whether the committee and Parliament acted lawfully.
