Presidential spokesperson Vincent Magwenya says there is a sense of urgency on President Cyril Ramaphosa’s part to fill vacancies that currently exist in his cabinet and he will do so in the next few days.
Magwenya’s briefing comes just hours after the resignation of David Mabuza as a member of Parliament, effectively ending his tenure as Deputy President of the country.
There has been growing concern about the delay in Ramaphosa announcing his new cabinet.
“There are vacancies in cabinet. We now also have a vacancy for the role of Deputy President. And so, there is a sense of urgency that the President fills those vacancies as soon as possible. So, in a matter of days that announcement will be made so I would say to you be on standby for my advisory alerting you to that announcement.”
Magwenya was briefing the media at the Union Buildings in Pretoria on the President’s weekly diary:
SABC Board
Magwenya says certain issues, including objections about some candidates, must be resolved before President Cyril Ramaphosa is able to announce a new Board for the SABC.
Magwenya says a 20th December shortlist of the names of the non-executive board candidates needed various clarifications by parliament itself, thus delaying the final list received by the President to January 2023.
He says the President additionally needs clarity around objections to some of those shortlisted.
Last week, Media Monitoring Africa filed an urgent application in the Constitutional Court to compel Ramaphosa to appoint a new board, saying that the delays in doing so are unconstitutional.
Magwenya had this response: “There were objections that we believe were sent to Parliament and those objections were also sent to the President with respect to certain individuals. The President wanted clarification as to how those objections were dealt with. So, we had those issues that we needed clarification on and that contributed to the delay and we hope those issues will be clarified fairly soon and we can proceed.”
Phala Phala matter
Magwenya says the President’s legal team will consider other remedies following the Constitutional Court’s dismissal of his bid for direct access to challenge the Section 89 Independent Panel report on Phala Phala.
The apex court concluded that no case had been made for exclusive jurisdiction or direct access to the Concourt. The main application and the intervention application by the EFF and ATM among others were subsequently dismissed. However, the order did not delve into the merits of the President’s case.
Magwenya elaborates, “That judgment deals with what I would call a procedural matter with respect to the President seeking direct access to the Constitutional Court. That judgment does not pronounce on the merits of the case, that judgment just says there is no case for the ConCourt to be petitioned directly. What will happen now, the legal team will convene and map the way forward and consider the options going forward but it’s not necessarily a blow. our view is that he was correct in doing so because the matter concerned a report that was siezed with the conduct of the President.
