Only three National Assembly members made submissions to section 89 panel

The Section 89 Independent Panel of Experts started its assessment of all the information received to determine whether President Cyril Ramaphosa has a case to answer on Constitutional grounds or not.

Ramaphosa is facing possible removal from office. This comes after the African Transformation Movement (ATM) brought a draft motion, calling for Ramaphosa’s removal from office in terms of Section 89 of the Constitution.

It followed the alleged theft of millions of US Dollars from Ramaphosa’s Phala Phala farm in Limpopo more than two years ago. Ramaphosa allegedly concealed the theft.

The panel says it received submissions from only three members of the National Assembly (NA) who provided information.

Section 89 Panel Spokesperson Reverend Mbuyiselo Stemela says the three are members from the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), African Transformation Movement (ATM) and the United Democratic Movement (UDM).

The three-member panel chaired by Retired Chief Justice Sandile Ngcobo, gave any NA member who wished to make submissions, to do so from October 22 to 27, 2022.

Ramaphosa was then given time to respond to the submitted information from October 28 and not later than November 6, 2022.

President Ramaphosa meets the submission deadline for Section 89 Independent Panel:

Stemela says Ramaphosa managed to submit his responses before the deadline expired.

He says Ramaphosa’s submission was received at around nine o’clock on Sunday evening. He says the panel is still assessing all the submitted information.

The assessment will be based on the ATM draft motion, the information received from the three NA members, President Ramaphosa’s response, as well as additional research which is required by the panel.

The panel has nine more days left to conclude its work and report back to National Assembly Speaker Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula.