The Democratic Alliance is again looking to get rid of President Jacob Zuma with a motion of no confidence in parliament.
The Democratic Alliance (DA) announced in a press conference on Thursday that this motion was not about the DA, but about the African National Congress.
While the DA has tried and failed before to get Zuma removed through this process, DA leader Mmusi Maimane said they could not simply sit by and do nothing, because they risked the motion not being passed.
It hoped to get the motion through by the end of the year.
The motion would be an opportunity for those “frustrated ANC members” to speak out, the DA said.
“We must ask for those spineless people to find their backbone and stand up,” Maimane said.
The DA did not take the decision lightly, he said, as they realised that there was scepticism when a minority party tabled a motion that required majority support.
The DA gave examples of ANC leaders who had recently spoken out against the decision to charge Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan as evidence of discontent on the ANC benches.
DA chief whip John Steenhuisen said what had been missing previously in the ANC was courage.
“We need men and women of good courage to stand up and say enough is enough,” he said.
‘ANC must work with us to remove Zuma’
In March, the DA’s motion of no confidence in Zuma failed when 225 MPs voted against the motion, while 99 voted for, and 22 MPs abstained.
The motion was not about the merits or successes and failures of previous motions similar to this one, Maimane said.
“It’s about the ANC. Because it will present the party with two very clear choices. Either, its Parliamentary Caucus could appreciate the current societal malaise, introspect, and vote with conscience in supporting the motion to remove Jacob Zuma from office.”
Or the ANC could show their full confidence in Zuma “and defend the indefensible at all costs”, the DA said.
“This is a golden opportunity for the ANC to stop playing ‘hot potato’ politics; we all know the root cause of our country’s current turmoil, and the time for passing blame is over. The ANC must work with us in Parliament to remove Jacob Zuma, once and for all, so we can get our country working again.”
The party had written to the speaker to have the motion included in this term’s programme.
It would not be looking for a secret ballot, the DA said.
Maimane said on Wednesday that South Africa needed to be released from President Jacob Zuma’s “death grip” as soon as possible.
Announcing that the party is to table a motion of no confidence in the president, he told a press briefing in Parliament that South Africa was fast approaching the tipping point.
“On almost every front, and in almost every community, our country faces unprecedented crises that threaten to undermine the progress our nation has made since 1994, and jeopardise our shared future.
“Our economy is flirting dangerously with recession with no leadership from the president to turn this around. Close to nine million South Africans still cannot find a job in order to provide for themselves and their loved ones. Zuma’s ‘nine-point plan’ to grow the economy and create jobs is so underwhelming even the president himself cannot recite the plan, nevermind implement it.
“Our higher education sector, essential for providing skills for the economy and helping young South Africans access opportunities, is on the brink of collapse, starved of funding and leadership by the ANC government … President Zuma remains nowhere to be found,” Maimane said.
Maimane told reporters Zuma continued his personal project of state capture, flooding state institutions with “yes-men”.
The National Prosecuting Authority had become the newest weapon in Zuma’s arsenal, bringing “suspicious” charges of fraud against Minister of Finance Pravin Gordhan. This had “created a real fear that the president is determined to get rid of the one set of stable hands in government still available to navigate our country through these troubled times”.
Maimane said: “As a nation, we must be honest and ask ourselves how long we are prepared to wait.
How long can we continue to allow Zuma to break our economy, and ruin the future of millions of South Africans?”
The DA had therefore decided to table in Parliament a motion of no confidence in the president. It would do so before year-end.
The party has tried twice before for a vote of no confidence but failed.
Maimane said he knew there was scepticism when a minority party tabled a motion requiring majority support, but “we simply can’t sit by and do nothing because of the risk of the motion not being passed. We cannot render the role of Parliament and the constitutional provisions involved to be rendered useless.
He said it was a golden opportunity for the ANC to “work with us in Parliament to remove Zuma, once and for all, so we can get our country working again”.
ANC Chief Whip, Jackson Mthembu, has called on all ANC executive leadership to step down.
Mthembu reportedly told City Press newspaper that the governing party with its current leadership is worse than its apartheid predecessors.
He has also slammed the use of state organs to settle political scores, with Finance Minister, Pravin Gordhan, now facing fraud charges.
Mthembu says he’s been silent for too long, and the time has now come for the ANC to make some changes.
He warned that the party might find itself in the cold in the 2019 National Government Elections.
On Sunday morning, Mthembu gave a lengthy interview outlining his position.
Trailing his interview are comments such as these below:
“When I said the entire ANC leadership must take the fall I meant everybody, myself included” –
“As the #ANC leadership we must take a collective fall” – ANC Chief Whip
“The way we are pursuing Pravin, from that angle we’re worse than the Apartheid regime”
If I was in a faction – Mandela, Sisulu & Tambo would be in my faction. What is happening is indefensible
SOURCE: eNCA
The ANC must work with us in parliament to remove Jacob Zuma, once and for all, so we can get our country working again