A parliamentary meeting on military veterans’ court-ordered benefits stalled in a bitter row on Wednesday. EFF MP Carl Niehaus told colleagues he did not “need to be lectured” as ANC MPs pushed back against a bid to postpone it.
Members of the Portfolio Committee on Defence and Military Veterans spent the opening of the virtual sitting arguing over whether to go ahead without Defence Minister Angie Motshekga and the Department of Military Veterans’ acting director-general, Nontobeko Mafu.
DA MP Emma Powell proposed a postponement. “The minister and the director-general have the fiduciary responsibility in law for the implementation of this court judgment, as the respondents. They therefore have the obligation to answer any questions before this committee on the implementation of the High Court judgment.
“The deputy minister exercises delegated authority. Executive authority in law vests in the minister and the accounting officer. It is our job in law to hold the minister accountable, and if the minister is not here, we are unable to fulfil our functions and our purpose. The cavalier way in which ministers decide on a whim whether they will attend meetings they are requested to attend is not acceptable, “she said.
Niehaus seconded the proposal.
But ANC MP Windy Plaatjies disagreed. “We are not a portfolio committee that relies on the presence of the minister, or the DG, to do our oversight. If tomorrow the minister is not available, when are we going to convene as a committee, if we want the minister to attend our meetings at all times? To me, the reasoning for postponing this meeting does not stand,” he argued.
ANC MP Sisipho Jama said postponing would set a bad precedent. “I don’t want us to hold ourselves hostage by saying the work of this portfolio committee can’t be done in the absence of the minister. I think that sets a bad precedent, and we may never do any work,” she said.
Committee content advisor Wilhelm Janse van Rensburg told members that Motshekga had also asked for next week’s committee meeting to be postponed.
Niehaus then asked for the EFF’s objection to be recorded. “The Economic Freedom Fighters state our opposition to the continuation of this meeting. If it continues, it’s because the majority, and specifically the African National Congress, wants to continue. We still support that a strongly worded letter be sent to the minister and to the acting director-general objecting to their absence,” he said.
When an MP objected that Niehaus had already had his say, Niehaus replied: “I was proceeding in accordance with your request on how we proceed from here. And I do not need to be lectured by the parties about meeting procedure.”
Powell then asked whether any of the four respondents cited in the court order were in the meeting. The secretariat confirmed that the two chief directors were present, then it was ruled that the meeting would proceed.
In a written parliamentary question in October, Niehaus asked Motshekga about an earlier committee meeting on the same judgment on 17 June, which he said was also held “again in her absence”.