The Phala Phala matter is back in Parliament after political parties pushed that it be dealt with in a debate after new information emerged from the tax agency this week.
Speaker Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula said the matter would be handled in a plenary where political parties would make declarations.
The EFF and DA had written to Mapisa-Nqakula asking her to bring it back on the agenda after Parliament last year rejected the Section 89 report on whether President Cyril Ramaphosa should be impeached.
The opposition said on Thursday that during the meeting of the programming committee, due to new information from the South African Revenue Service that the $580 000 was not declared, that the issue should be back for discussion.
SARS later said Ramaphosa and the Ntaba Nyoni farm were tax-compliant and urged all political leaders to also follow tax laws.
But the opposition said they wanted an ad hoc committee to be established to deal with the Phala Phala matter.
Mapisa-Nqakula said the programming committee would next Thursday give a date when the issue would be brought for discussion in Parliament.
“This matter is a matter which will be dealt with in a session, where declarations by different political parties will be allowed,” said Mapisa-Nqakula.
Deputy Speaker Lechesa Tsenoli denied claims by the opposition that Parliament had protected Ramaphosa when Phala Phala was debated last year.
The EFF and UDM members said Parliament shielded Ramaphosa.
But Tsenoli said this was not the case.
“Honourable Nqaba Kwankwa made a point I disagree with fundamentally. We protected nobody in the House. When the president exercises his legal rights it cannot be reduced to us protecting him. In the first place, what is the rule of law if it does not mean if there is still room for you to go to court to require them to intervene on your behalf. How can it mean that we are protecting him? They mustn’t say so if it doesn’t affect them in their interest because the decision-making is that there should be a vote. It must be clear that Parliament is a democratic process, it’s a multi-party process and the implications are that a vote will go according to the preference of each political party. I disagree with the assertion that we protected the president. That’s not our job. Our job is to run Parliament properly, follow the rules. If we do not follow the rules then we would have been wrong. But we followed the rules and the president has rights like all of us,” said Tsenoli.
siyabonga.mkhwanazi@inl.co.za
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