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Political parties welcome judgment on impeaching a sitting President

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Political parties in Parliament have welcome the Constitutional Court judgment paving the way to initiate proceedings to impeach a sitting President.  The court ruled that Parliament has failed to hold President  Jacob Zuma accountable following it’s ruling on Nkandla.

United Democratic Movement (UDM) leader Bantu Holomisa says it was a wise move by some of the opposition parties to take this matter to court. Holomisa is pinning his hopes on the new ANC leadership to make sure that Parliament exercises its oversight role vigorously and work with the opposition to amend rules to allow for the impeachment of a sitting President.

“We made a wise decision by calling for the National Assembly to start a process of impeaching Zuma so I think the court has given us a guideline to say go back and develop rules as soon as possible so let’s hope that the so called new ANC will support the opposition parties and make sure that we produce these rules and regulations as soon as possible,” says Holomisa .

Both the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) and the  African People’s Convention (APC) also welcome the judgment.

“We’d like to thank the political parties that initiated the matter in court. This particular ruling now doesn’t give us any lee way that will establish a committee to oversee vote one of the presidency and arising out of that obviously all the expenditure within the presidency will arise,” said IFP Chief Whip Narend Singh.

We are happy that the matter has been clarified not because of president Zuma, but because the Constitution is there for everybody so anybody who will be President, whether in 10 years or 30 years, Parliament will know what to do,” said APC leader Themba Godi.

WATCH: EFF reacts to ConCourt ruling

The Executive Secretary for CASAC, Lawson Naidoo, says the Constitutional Court’s judgment  is  significant in so many ways. Naidoo says the judgment is good for democracy.

“Institutional democracy and strengthening mechanisms for accountability in particular highlights Parliament’s failure in putting in place mechanisms to hold the President to account,” he said.

WATCH: Lawson Naidoo reacts to Constitutional Court’s judgement

Parliament has given the assurance that it will ensure the finalisation of the National Assembly’s rules, in line with the Constitutional Court ruling.

Spokesperson for Parliament, Moloto Mothapo, says the institution has already begun to overhaul the rules.

“We will ensure that the judgment of the court is fully implemented. Parliament had already begun a process of overhauling the rules we have recently adopted to overhaul the rules to realise Section 89.”

Parliament also says it agrees with the reservation and caution expressed by both the Chief Justice and his deputy in the minority judgment, regarding the encroachment of the judiciary into the internal functioning of Parliament.

Meanwhile, the ANC says it will study the judgment and discuss its full implementation when the NEC meets on January 10, 2018.

 

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