Lucas Ledwaba
Unless a miracle of Biblical proportions happens between this evening and tomorrow when the IEC completes the testing task of counting votes, indications are that Parliament’s erstwhile servant, Themba Godi, may join the long list of the country’s jobless.
Godi has been the Chairperson for the Standing Committee on Public Accounts (SCOPA) since February 2005.
He has been a Member of Parliament since 2004 and served in numerous capacities including in the Portfolio Committees on Trade and Industry, Labour, Social Development, and Education. But the position of SCOPA chair has become synonymous with the man from Bushbuckridge.
However, results coming in from Wednesday’s poll signal the end of Godi’s parliamentary career. His African People’s Convention (APC) had scored a paltry 15,630 votes by Friday early afternoon.
It would require a miracle for the APC, one of numerous breakaways from the PAC of Azania, to reach the 37,000-vote threshold required to earn a parliamentary seat.
IEC stats show that most of the votes, 4,062, came from Godi’s home province of Mpumalanga, followed by 3,542 in Limpopo and surprisingly close by 2,900 in KwaZulu-Natal and 2,415 in the Eastern Cape.
The APC scored 1,811 in Gauteng, 1,284 in Northwest, 902 in the Western Cape and a paltry 608 in Northern Cape. The results were correct as at 1pm on Friday. If he doesn’t make it back to Parliament, which looks a certainty, Godi will be remembered by some as a loyal servant of the institution and by others as a chairperson who enjoyed a disturbing, cosy relationship with the ruling ANC.
