PUPLIC PROTECTOR’S CRITICISM AGAINST PARLIAMENTARY AD HOC COMMITTEE

3 August 2015

The Office of the ANC Chief Whip notes the statement made to the media this afternoon by the Public Protector, Adv. Thuli Madonsela, regarding the decision of the parliamentary ad hoc committee set up to consider the Police Minister’s report on the security upgrades at the private residence of the President. In her media briefing, Adv. Madonsela criticised the committee for its decision not to invite her to provide committee members with clarity on some of the issues she deems important to its work.

From the onset, we wish to reaffirm the ANC’s respect and support for all institutions established by the Constitution to support our democracy, including the office of the Public Protector. We however do not believe that any principled criticism based on the work of these institutions, or disagreement expressed in the course of robust debates in parliament, is tantamount to “vicious attacks” – as claimed by the Public Protector today. In our view such a claim is without foundation and thus unfortunate.

We wish to reiterate that the committee’s terms of reference, also explicitly captured in the committee’s name, is to consider the report of the Police Minister on the security upgrades at the President’s residence in Nkandla. The committee was not set up to consider the report of the Public Protector, as this report had already been dealt with by the previous ad hoc committee in 2014.

The ad hoc committee was tasked with calling those institutions Parliament has instructed to act on its recommendations to brief it on the work done and provide clarifications where necessary. These are the departments whose reports it has the responsibility to interrogate and powers to change in line with its terms of reference.

Calling the public protector to appear before the committee would be tantamount to rehashing the investigation of the chapter 9 institution whose report the committee has no powers to change in terms of the law. It is neither practical nor sustainable that an institution should be called to respond before Parliament whenever a view is expressed regarding reports it released.

We note and agree with the views expressed by all political parties in the ad hoc committee following their eye-opening visit to Nkandla that the description of the upgrades as luxurious, opulent and comfortable does not correlate with the reality on the ground. Allcommittee members were shocked during the visit to discover that the features previously described as luxury, opulent, comfortable and secure at Nkandla were in fact shoddy workmanship, poor quality and the standard as well as the scope of the features were grossly misrepresented.

This flies in the face of the Public Protector’s report, titled “Secure in Comfort” to describe the nature of the upgrades, amongst others, making the descriptions under the “Analysis and Conclusion” Section of the Report that “the excessive nature in which the Nkandla Project was implemented went a long way to beautify the President’s private residence and to add comfort to its infrastructure” and also that “the question that arises is whether or not the family has and will continue to unduly benefit from the luxurious items…”

It is such descriptions used by the Public Protector in her report which made MPs to observe that the descriptions of certain aspects of the upgrades were misrepresented.

We are taken aback by Adv. Madonsela’s allegation that parliament is deliberately withholding funds to increase her budget to punish her for her investigation into Nkandla security upgrades. Such allegation is baseless and sounds like political posturing.

We wish to reiterate that the justice and correctional services committee, which engaged the public protector on this matter, was correct to emphasise the need for Parliament to have a look at the nature of cases various chapter 9 institutions are dealing with before any appeal for drastic budget increase such as the one asked by Adv Madonsela can be entertained.

The committee’s decision is also aimed at ensuring that the important issue of overlap or duplication of functions amongst state institutions, which may in certain instances put extraordinary burden on some institutions at the expense of others, can be addressed. The Public Protector has requested an increase of R200m over and above her current allocation of R246m.

As the ANC, we have consistently supported the drastic increases of the Public Protector budget over and above those of other Chapter 9 institutions in the last six years. The Public Protector`s budget, for instance, is currently standing at R246m, more than double that of the sister chapter 9 institution, the SAHRC, which is currently at around R140m. We have supported these increases due to the ever increasing cases which places additional burden on the investigative capacity of the institution.

However, we agree that our national fiscus does not have a bottomless purse and therefore avoiding duplications or overlap of functions will go a long way in ensuring these state institutions share the burden, which would lift financial drain on others. The Public Protector’s Office has thus far not acceded the committee’s request to brief it on the cases it is investigating.

We believe that by criticising the parliamentary committee on her exclusion even before it could conclude its work, Adv. Madonsela is acting hastily and is interfering in the work of Parliament. The appropriate thing to do would have been for her to wait until the committee releases a report on its work and make an informed judgment regarding whether her appearance before the committee would have assisted Parliament to reach a different conclusion.

We appeal to the Public Protector to give Parliament the necessary space and respect to do its work and report to the public.

Statement issued by the Office of the ANC Chief Whip, August 3 2015