Speaker’s refusal to grant secret ballot is irrational

2 December 2020

Further to the Motion of No Confidence in President Ramaphosa which has been scheduled for the 3rd of December, the ATM has since been persuading the Speaker to allow a situation where members of Parliament are enabled to vote freely with their conscience where there would be no consequential hardships as a result of how they would have voted. The Speaker has flatly refused this request, citing very flimsy reasons. It’s almost like the Speaker wants to see blood and loss of life for her to comprehend the toxic and highly charged environment at play in the political battlefield.

The ATM has been forced to resort to Courts to persuade the Speaker to exercise her powers in a manner that the Constitutional Court on the matter between the UDM vs Speaker and others directed.

The Constitutional Court said, “There must always be a proper and rational basis for whatever choice the Speaker makes in the exercise of the constitutional power to determine the voting procedure. Due regard must always be had to real possibilities of corruption as well as the prevailing circumstances and whether they allow Members to exercise their vote in a manner that does not expose them to illegitimate hardships. Whether the prevailing atmosphere is generally peaceful or toxified and highly charged, is one of the important aspects of that decision-making process.”

The Speaker's loyalty to her party has prevented her from conceding to the legitimate plea of the ATM to have voting conducted in a secret ballot. In the letter to the Speaker, the ATM pointed out that the conditions precedent for the secret ballot are too many to list. The ATM reminded the Speaker that already two members from the opposition party whose names are in the public domain have been exposed as beneficiaries of the CR17 campaign funds. That alone should have been enough as a red flag to indicate that a suspicion that many more could be in the CR17 payroll is justified.

Also, the recent events in Bloemfontein where the T-shirts bearing the face of Ramaphosa were burnt in protest during the bail application of a senior ANC member is the clearest example of a toxified and highly charged environment that the Constitutional Court cited as a legitimate precondition for a secret ballot.

All these legitimate examples fell on deaf ears living the ATM no choice but seek to protect democracy, the objectives of the Constitution, and Rules of Parliament by approaching the High Court in the Western Cape for relief.

South African needs to be saved from the non-existent leadership of Ramaphosa. In total contrast to his election promise, the man has been nothing but a champion of malfeasance. With Ramaphosa at the helm, the country has suffered the following setbacks:-

1. Irregular expenditure for the fin year 2018/19 ballooned to more than R61bn;

2. Unemployment has shot up to nearly 50% on an expanded definition;

3. Country debt to GDP ratio is abnormally projected to more than 80% for 2020;

4. The country has been plunged into junk status by two global rating agencies;

5. Gender-Based Violence on the steep rise;

6. Performance Management Contracts of Ministers still not signed;

7. Corruption is an exponential trajectory including officials in his office;

8. Failure to take the country into his confidence and unseal the CR17 bank statements;

9. Failure to even-handedly hold his Ministers to account for unethical conduct that has been revealed in the State Of Capture Commission;

10. Failure to bring closure on whether Gauteng residents should still be saddled with e-tolls;

11. His sanctioning of a trip to Zimbabwe in the middle of an international lockdown, that resulted in the use of an SA military aircraft to advance the affairs of the party.

Members of Parliament are called upon to put South Africans First by supporting this No Confidence Motion.

Issued by the African Transformation Movement, 2 December 2020