When peacekeepers attack: Why SA troops are in harm’s way in the DRC

No Fear No Favour No Retreating..........



Simon Allison SOUTH AFRICA  30 AUGUST 2013    00:44

South African soldiers are again coming under fire in a messy conflict in central Africa. This time, the setting is the Democratic Republic of Congo. What are we doing there, and why are we on the attack? By SIMON ALLISON.

First, the good news, as clarified on Thursday by South African National Defence Force (SANDF) spokesman Xolani Mabanga: no South African soldiers have been killed or seriously injured in fighting in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, despite contradictory reports on social media. “This is just mere propaganda and psychological warfare from the rebel forces who want to portray their so called success against the DRC government troops,” added Mabanga.

But our soldiers were not completely unscathed. Two were injured on Wednesday as South African troops provided support to the Congolese army (one was shot, the other hit by shrapnel), while a third soldier was wounded by shrapnel when a mortar landed close to their base in Goma. Mabanga told Daily Maverick that these were all minor injuries and the affected soldiers are in good condition.

Still, the news that South African troops are coming under hostile fire, and not for the first time this year, raises a few questions. For a nation at peace, we seem to be doing an awful lot of fighting in central Africa.

In March, a contingent of SANDF soldiers got caught up in the rebellion in the Central African Republic, which ousted the president. With no mandate to be there, and playing a decidedly ambiguous role, SANDF was perceived by some of the rebels to be on the president’s side, and therefore a legitimate target. Fourteen soldiers lost their lives.

Just a few months later, and in the same region, South African troops are once again caught up in hostile fire. This time, however, the situation is a little different.

A few things set the involvement in the DRC apart from the Central African Republic debacle. For a start, we’re not on our own. The SANDF is part of the Force Intervention Brigade (FIB) along with troops from Tanzania and Malawi. Tanzania’s been hit even worse by the recent fighting, with one soldier killed on Wednesday.

Secondly, South Africa has history in the DRC, 11 years of it. South African troops were part of United Nations peacekeeping efforts in the country as early as 2002, and our politicians have also tried their hand at mediation on occasion (hasn’t really worked out so far…). The DRC has really been the place where our government has tried to assume the mantle of African leadership, and, for better or worse, they have backed up their commitment with boots on the ground. There’s plenty of diplomatic capital at stake.

Finally, the South African soldiers have a United Nations mandate to be there. SANDF has been involved in a variety of UN peacekeeping missions to the DRC sanctioned by the UN Security Council, which gives their presence legitimacy under international law.

But the latest UN mandate, the one that created the FIB, goes beyond mere peacekeeping, authorising the unit to go on the attack and actively intervene in conflict situations when necessary. It’s peacekeeping with teeth, and is something of an experiment that could determine the future of international intervention in conflict zones.

It does mean, however, that South African troops are at times actively putting themselves in harm’s way. This was the case on Wednesday, when an FIB contingent supported the Congolese army’s attempts to rid the city of Goma of rebels from the M23 movement, which the UN and various rights groups claim is supported by Rwanda. Actually, the attack on Wednesday was a pretty momentous moment in UN peacekeeping history. “At 10 minutes to eight yesterday morning, the FIB … fired the opening shots of the first ever direct attack on rebel forces in UN peacekeeping history,” explained Darren Olivier for African Defence Review. There’s no going back now.

The cross-border politics in this part of the world are particularly messy, and the UN is finding it difficult to negotiate the complexities with the new intervention force, which has changed the dynamics somewhat.

As regional expert Jason Stearns explained on his blog, Congo Siasa, (writing before Wednesday’s joint offensive with the Congolese army): “On the military front, the UN has a difficult needle to thread. If it does not go on the offensive, it will disappoint after months of hype building up around the Intervention Brigade. The Congolese government is purposely ratcheting up the pressure on the UN to make it use military force and to position the blue helmets as scapegoats if anything goes wrong. But a military offensive contains plenty of dangers: the M23 could embarrass the UN troops, or UN troops could be complicit in abuses carried out by the Congolese army. Any military action could also upset whatever diplomatic approaches are being made with Rwanda and the M23.”

It’s a dangerous game, and South Africa has put itself right in the middle of it. Nonetheless, and injuries notwithstanding, SANDF spokesman Mabanga is confident that it’s the right move: “The mission so far is going well.” At this stage, it’s too early to share his confidence. DM

Read more:

• SANDF: No SA soldiers killed in DRC, at Mail & Guardian

Photo: A Congolese government military tank patrols in Kanyarucinya village in the outskirts of Goma in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, August 22, 2013. The head of the U.N. peacekeeping mission in Congo on Thursday ordered his troops to take whatever action was needed to protect civilians after shelling hit the city of Goma on the Rwandan border in renewed fighting between the army and M23 rebels. REUTERS/Kenny Katombe

DAILY MAVERICK

COMMENTS BY SONNY

While in a 'War Zone' South African Troops cannot 'Pussy-Foot' with the enemy - THEY MUST 'KICK-ASS' AND BE COUNTED!

NO SA CASUALTIES ONLY VICTORIES!!

WE WERE DRAWN INTO THIS FIGHT UNDER FALSE PRETENCES.

BLOOD DIAMONDS WILL BE THE PAYMENT ON THE TABLE TO THE DESPOTS INVOLVED!

Who is this traitor F W De Klerk ex President of the Republic of South Africa.

No Fear No Favour No Forgiveness........


JOHANNESBURG 28 AUGUST 2013 17:37  STAFF REPORTED

FW de Klerk and the Mindset of Treason

F.W de Klerk was once seen as being one of the most conservative in the NP government. What is it that changed him? How does one man, bordering on the extreme right wing in his party change to become one of the most liberal and hand the country over to Marxist terrorists? Did the change come out of his own accord or was he forced to change?

From history we see that there are several reasons why people become traitors or cross over to the other side. The main reasons are represented by the acronym M.I.C.E… Money, Ideology, Coercion and Ego, or any combination of the above. Of these, Ego is the most common one. Traitors are criminals of the worst kind, and something that criminals all share is their own greed and the belief that they will never be caught. They have strong narcissistic tendencies and an inherent belief that they are somehow special.

What was it that moved F.W. de Klerk to become one of the worst traitors of his people to date? Was it one of the above, or all of the above…or was it a specific combination? In this article I will explore whether F.W. de Klerk fits the criteria to be called a traitor as well as delve a bit deeper into life of this infamous Nobel laureate.

• IDEOLOGY
• EGO
• MONEY
• COERCION

The “I” for Ideology
Several authors as well as F.W. de Klerk’s own brother Wimpie de Klerk and F.W de Klerk himself, state that F.W. never really experienced a liberal Damascus conversion moment. With him it was a slow, gradual change. This is not entirely true. F.W. de Klerk did have a Damascus moment…well sort of.

To fully grasp his conversion, it is necessary to explore the ideology of F.W. de Klerk prior to his February 1990 speech. When we say he was conservative or religious, we need to define HOW conservative and HOW religious he actually was. For that, we need to digress slightly and explore the general beliefs and religious convictions of the Afrikaners in South Africa.

For the most part Afrikaners are staunch protestant people. Since the arrival of the first Dutch farmers at the Cape of Good Hope in 1652, they brought their Dutch Reformed Church (Nederduits Gereformeerde Kerk) NGK and Calvinistic religion with them. Highly educated ministers or “Dominees” were imported from the Netherlands. NG Kerk dominees study theology for seven years at university.

By 1834 when the Great Trek started on the Eastern Frontier in what is today the Eastern Cape, the Dutch Reformed Church (NGK) was one of the mightiest organizations in the Cape, and was opposed to the Great Trek. The Farmers who trekked and who later started their own Republics namely the ZAR (Transvaal) and the Orange Free State therefore started a new Church independent from the Dutch Reform Church or NGK. This church is known today as the “Hervormde Kerk” or “Reconstituted Church”. The Hervormde Kerk (HK) also imported their own Dominees from the Netherlands.

At the time there was a debate going on in the Netherlands on whether hymns should be sung in church together with Psalms or only Psalms. The argument was, “In God’s Church, only God’s word”. The argument was that hymns were sometimes of unknown and therefore dubious origins, and could have been inspired by Satan who urged a drunk to write a hymn in his drunken state. Actually they found that some of the hymns were in contradiction to the Calvinistic teachings, the Canons of Dort and the Belgic Confession.

A dominee called Dirk Postma arrived in the Boer Republic of the ZAR to take up service in the Hervormde Kerk, but upon hearing that he might have to sing Hymns in church, he broke away with 15 members and a short while later started a new Ultra Conservative church called the Gereformeerde Kerk or (GK) and enrolled 300 members. So at this stage there were three of these Dutch Reformed Churches. The Nederduits Gereformeerde Kerk (NGK) of the Cape, The Hervormde Church (HK) of the Transvaal and the Gereformeerde Kerk (GK), the Boer Church.

One of the founding fathers of the GK church was Boer President Paul Kruger himself. Together with his15 founder brothers and 300 new members they founded the GK under a seringboom in Rustenburg in 1859. Paul Kruger was a deeply religious man. He also believed that the earth was flat and claimed that he only ever read one book in his life and that was the Bible. He said that he did not need any other books. He knew most of the Bible off by heart.(Maritin Meredith Diamonds, Gold and War. (New York:PublicAffairs),pg 76.)

The GK or “Dopper” Chruch is still known today as the “Boer Church”.

Why is the GK church known as the “Doppers”? The word comes from the Dutch name for a small bowl. When one places such a small bowl on someone’s head and shave off all the protruding hair, one ends up with a peculiar conservative and puritan hairstyle of the time. The Doppers calls the DRC or Nederduits Gereformeerde Kerk (NGK) members, “Gatjieponders”…the word comes from “Gat-Jappon” which literally translates to “Arse-coat” referring to the tuxedo style coats they used to wear 200 years ago. But I am digressing…

Nevertheless, all three churches – NGK, HK and GK – are sister churches and the dogma is basically the same, i.e. Calvinistic. The only difference is the singing of hymns in church. The GK only sings Psalms and what is called “Skrifberymings”, text out of the Bible rewritten to rhyme and given melodies.

Another difference is the belief of the Ultra Conservative “Dopper” Church, is that God personally intervenes in the lives of people, and that when one prays long and hard enough, God will show one the way…show one which course to take. They believe that one can get a calling from God. In Afrikaans it is called a “Roeping”. F.W. De Klerk was, and still is,  such an Ultra Conservative Christian… a “Dopper”, a member of the Boer Church.

During his times of intense introspection, F.W. de Klerk also searched for such a sign from God, to show him the way, a calling to do something great. The sign eventually came in the form of his personal friend and Dopper Dominee, Pieter Bingle of Cape Town. De Klerk, his wife Marike and Pieter Bingle knew each other since their student days at the Potchefstroom University. Pieter Bingle was at the wedding of his son and testified in the murder trial following the murder of former First Lady Marike de Klerk. Pieter Bingle and F.W. De Klerk are also members of the same Afrikanerbond lodge (afdeling) , Leeuwenhof in Cape Town.

At the inauguration of F.W. de Klerk as State President, Dominee Pieter Bingle gave a sermon…His text was from Jeremiah 23 verse 16 and 22.

Jeremiah 23: 16

Thus says the LORD of hosts:
Do not listen to the words of the prophets who prophesy to you.
They make you worthless;
They speak a vision of their own heart,
Not from the mouth of the LORD.

Verse 22

But if they had stood in My counsel, And had caused My people to hear My words, Then they would have turned them from their evil way And from the evil of their doings.

In essence, Dominee Pieter Bingle told F.W. De Klerk to stop listening to the people and his advisers who were all “false prophets”. He told De Klerk that he was standing in the Council Chamber of the Lord, that he was an instrument of God. He told De Klerk that he who stands in the Council Chamber of the Lord will be aggressive enough to tackle problems and challenges fearlessly.

Further extracts from Pieter Bingle speech include:

New ways will have to be found where roads enter cul de sacs, or are worn out or cannot carry the heavy traffic. Excess baggage will be cast aside. Certain will stay and others will have to be discarded. Those stuck in the grooves of the past will find that besides the spelling, depth is the only difference between a groove and a grave.

Mr. de Klerk, as our new President, God is calling you to do his will. Today God calls you to serve as the President of South Africa. God’s commission is not to serve as the President of some of the people, but as the President of all the people of South Africa.

F.W. De Klerk was deeply moved by Pieter Bingle’s sermon. He was literally in tears. At a post inaugural meeting he told his friends and families that they should pray for him while the tears were flowing down his cheeks. He said that God called him to do a specific task…to save South Africa…To save all the people of South Africa. He said that he knew he would be rejected by his own people, but that he had to walk this road and that his friends and family should help him. He confessed that God had called him and that he could not ignore the call.

De Klerk, the narcissist, felt himself special…singled out by God Almighty to do this job…to commit the ultimate treason against his people.

From that day on, De Klerk knew what to do. God told him to hand over the country to a gang of Marxist terrorists.

Whilst De Klerk enjoyed his liberal Damascus moment, on the other side of the parliamentary benches, the Conservative party felt different. These people were also Christians who believed God told them to oppose De Klerk’s decisions such as Dr. Andries Treurnicht who was a Dutch Reform minister for 14 years himself and later became leader of the Conservative Party, the opposition of the National party.

But why was F.W. de Klerk in doubt to start off with? What cognitive dissonances were playing off in his mind at the time of his Bingle induced Damascus moment? Well, several things played a role. For that we need to go back to the mid 1980’s and the discussions between people at grill parties (Braais) a favorite past time of South Africans. We have to backtrack into the fears and doubts of the people of the time.

In 1985 president P.W. Botha scrapped the Mixed Marriages Act and the Immorality Act which outlawed interracial marriage and interracial sex. Since 1983 P.W. Botha split the Afrikaners down the middle with the HNP and CP on the right, and the NP and the PFP on the left. The PFP was run by a liberal Afrikaner called Dr. Van Zyl Slabbert. Inside the NP itself, one had three factions – Liberals (Verligtes), Moderates (Draadsitters), and Conservatives (Verkramptes).

Around the Braais one would find friends and family with the entire spectrum of political views debating religion and politics, of which few actually had any idea. The Afrikaners of the time were for the most part political ignoramuses. Their political believes were based on Black and White racial politics and the threat of Communism, which was from the Devil. Asked them what “Liberal” and “Conservative” meant, they probably would not know. Typical braai conversation between a liberal and a conservative Afrikaner and the liberal would ask the conservative would be:“OK, so you believe in Apartheid, but when you go to heaven, would there also be Apartheid in heaven? Does God have a heaven for blacks and another for whites, or how does it work? Or do you believe that only whites go to heaven? Do blacks also have souls or only whites? What about all those converted blacks out there who converted to Christianity?”

Another question would be, “OK, so you say you are so conservative… The laws have now changed. It is now possible for whites to marry or have sex with blacks…What are you going to do when your son or daughter comes home with a black man or a coloured woman?” So with these questions in the minds of white South Africans of the time let us consider the de Klerk family.

The De Klerk Family

When one thinks that F.W. de Klerk was Ultra Conservative then it is still nothing compared to Marike (Willemse) de Klerk, his first wife. She was an extremely benevolent person who helped the poor Afrikaners a lot, but she was even more conservative than F.W. De Klerk. Her father, Wilhelm Willemse, was an academic, writer and Professor of Social Pathology and Psychology at Pretoria University.

Nevertheless, the couple never had any children of their own. They adopted three children together – Jan, Willem, and Susan – whom they obviously brought up with their religious convictions and conservative values. Little Willem de Klerk, turned out to be the black sheep of the family.

He was about 18/19 at the time that P.W. Botha abolished the Immorality Act in 1985 that prohibited sex between whites and coloureds. He was also one of the first to take advantage of this new found freedom. F.W. de Klerk’s youngest son had a weakness for the coloured girls of Cape Town.

While he was a student at the Cape Technikon he met a young coloured lady that took his fancy called Erica Adams. Erica was the daughter of a Coloured politician namely Deon Adams of the Labour Party. They were madly and passionately in love and wanted to get married, but their engagement didn’t sit well with Marike at all. She resented the idea of coloured grandchildren, much less from the apple of her eye.

She told him, in no uncertain terms, that he was putting his entire father’s work in jeopardy and that would destroy South Africa if he continued the relationship. After two years of severe pressure from his mother, Willem finally ended the relationship with Erica. Instead, Willem went on to marry a white Afrikaner girl called Hermien Mostert, a former teacher with a senior post at Woolworths.

Nevertheless the marriage lasted four and a half years and the couple got divorced around the same time that F.W. de Klerk got divorced from Marike. During Willems marriage to Hermien, rumours started circling that he and a dark-haired woman frequented a popular restaurant in Kloofnek, Cape Town. Who was this mystery dark-haired woman? Her name was, Nicole Norodien – another coloured lady that Willem eventually married in Paarl in 2003.

As with Hermien, Willem started divorce proceedings with Nicole in 2009 (the case is still ongoing). This was after she had an affair with a Johannesburg Businessman, Ernest Lefebvre. During the divorce case she claimed that De Klerk was “unpredictable and aggressive” towards her, and that he is “emotionally and verbally abusive”. Norodien described him as “regularly intoxicated”, adding that he drank “excessive” amounts of alcohol and that he had been having an several affairs.

Nevertheless he had two children with Norodien and because of this, Norodien wanted the court to order De Klerk to pay her maintenance of R15 000 a month, as well as comprehensive medical aid cover, a car worth R300 000, a house of up to R2-million or R20 000 a month for accommodation and “household necessaries” worth R200 000. The question begs to be answered: Was Norodien right? Was Willem de Klerk now having another affair with another coloured woman? Yes.

Willem De Klerk, now 44 years old, has just (May 2011) settled out of court with another coloured woman named Desiré Joseph , a 27 year old midwife at the Tygerberg Hospital. She comes from the Boland town of Wellington where her parents own a furniture shop. Furthermore, she also claimed that he was the father of her child Ana-Wilmien, but Willem insisted on paternity tests – which proved he was indeed the father.

The end result today is that former President F.W. de Klerk now has three coloured grand-children. What white Afrikaners spoke about around braais happened to him. His son came home with a coloured woman (several in fact) and several grandchildren. How could he still morally justify Apartheid when his son was producing coloured grand children on a regular basis?  F.W. de Klerk’s superior education as a lawyer, his conservative convictions and his Ultra Conservative religious beliefs all came to naught when his youngest boy came home with a coloured girl.

As a once Ultra Conservative politician it must have chewed F.W. de Klerk up inside. Although Willem was an adopted child, he was still raised in the De Klerk household. He attended church and Sunday school, graduated with a “Boere Matriek” called “Katkisasie”, accepted into the Gereformeerde Kerk, the Boer church, yet he still discarded all of those conservative upbringings and went for race mixing. Under Apartheid laws F.W. de Klerk’s son would have been in prison.

F.W. de Klerk had to make peace with this and that his grand-children would be coloureds. As such, his Ideology changed from Ultra Conservative to Liberal. A rare occurrence indeed, as normally it’s the other way around.

Summary

With de Klerk, it clear that the entire scope of MICE was used to get De Klerk to capitulate and commit treason. His sins were covered up into the finest detail. The public was duped. The F.W. de Klerk that we saw on television was a tall clean shaven intelligent man always with a smile on his face. The people were taken in by him. He was the new broom, and boy was he sweeping clean…getting rid of all those cob-webs of the old Apartheid era. The real F.W. de Klerk was a different man altogether.

Today F.W. de Klerk is fully aware of the fact that white South Africans and other minorities consider him a traitor. In August 2010 F.W. de Klerk was interviewed by Murray La Vita of Beeld and F.W. said that the name “traitor” doesn’t bother him. The world acknowledged it after all when he received second prize at the Nobel prize ceremony, next to ex-terrorist Mandela.

FEINT & MARGIN

COMMENTS BY SONNY

How much water would be needed by F W De Klerk to wash all the feet of the Afrikaner Nation (Volk) whom he BETRAYED?

HISTORY WILL REVEAL HIS GUILT & REDEMPTION!

HOW MANY MORE MURDERS, FARM MURDERS, WHITE GENOCIDE AND RHINO MURDERS WILL IT TAKE FOR THE WORLD TO SIT UP AND TAKE NOTICE.....?

During the Anglo Boer War, the Boers used to execute traitors by firing squad.

To have and to hold Mr Zuma accountable – a pipedream made in the Concourt

No fear No Favour No True Justice.........



Ranjeni Munusami 28 August 2013 SOUTH AFRICA  01:46

On Tuesday, President Jacob Zuma was conferred with an Honorary Doctorate of Leadership from the Lim Kok Wing University in Malaysia, which he accepted on behalf of all the people of South Africa. (Congratulations to you all.) On the same day, the Constitutional Court of this country was ruling on the Democratic Alliance’s appeal on the scheduling in Parliament of a motion of no confidence debate against the president. The DA lost the appeal but the court compelled Parliament to change its rules to allow such a debate in future. Perhaps at another time, this will come in handy to opposition parties. But it will take a lot more than a change in parliamentary rules to hold the Teflon Man to account for his leadership. By RANJENI MUNUSAMY.


  In his acceptance speech after receiving the Honorary Doctorate of Leadership in Malaysia, President Jacob Zuma quoted Dr Tan Sri Lim Kok Wing, the founder of the university which was conferring the award on him.

“Life is about choice. We can choose to just complete a job or set out to do our best. It is better to attempt our best because then we test our limits. In doing this, we learn new things about ourselves and very often the work we produce will turn out to be outstanding.”

The irony of the highest court having to rule on a case about the right to vote him out of office for being a bad leader was obviously missed on the president. It is unclear what criteria the university used to decide to confer the award on Zuma or whether it was aware that eight opposition parties wanted the Constitutional Court to allow them to debate a motion of no confidence in the president.

The DA and seven other opposition parties in Parliament had attempted to bring the motion of no confidence before the House for debate last November. The motion was motivated by the Marikana killings, the Nkandlagate scandal, the non-delivery of textbooks to schools in Limpopo and the Eastern Cape, the downgrading of South Africa's credit rating by two major ratings agencies, the mounting disrespect for our Constitution and judiciary, high unemployment; and the “uncontrollable and rising tide” of corruption in the public service.

The ANC used its majority to block the matter from coming before the House and the Speaker Max Sisulu concluded that because there was no consensus in the programming committee, he could not schedule the debate.

On Friday 16 November 2012, the DA, through its parliamentary leader Lindiwe Mazibuko, took the matter to the Western Cape High Court seeking to compel the Speaker to urgently schedule the debate a vote in the National Assembly before the following Thursday, 22 November when Parliament went into recess. Judge Dennis Davis ruled that the Speaker did not have the residual power under the rules of Parliament to break the deadlock or schedule a debate of a motion of no confidence, acting on his own.

On Tuesday, the Constitutional Court upheld Davis’s ruling that the Speaker did not have the power to schedule a motion of no confidence in the president for debate. However, in a majority judgment written by Deputy Chief Justice Dikgang Moseneke, the court found that the parliamentary rules were unconstitutional as they did not “provide for a political party represented in, or a member of, the National Assembly to enforce the right to exercise the power to have a motion of no confidence in the President scheduled for a debate and voted upon in the National Assembly within a reasonable time, or at all”.

This finding was suspended for a period of six months to allow the National Assembly to “correct the defect”. Five other judges concurred with Moseneke’s judgment, while three judges, including Chief Justice Mogoeng Mogoeng, supported a minority judgment by Judge Chris Jafta that the separation of powers doctrine prevented the court from intervening in matters relating to Parliament.

Both the ANC and the DA, as well as the Speaker, claimed the outcome in the Constitutional Court as a victory for them.

“We hope that this judgment will serve as a strong lesson to the DA that internal parliamentary matters should be left to Parliament's own determination, not the courts. Parliament should not be controlled through the courts by those with deep pockets to bankroll their frivolous litigations,” the office of the ANC Chief Whip Stone Sizani said.

The ANC said it also welcomed the court’s directive that the rules be reviewed to allow MPs to propose motions and provide for a deadlock breaking mechanism.

The DA said the judgment was a “victory for democracy” as it prevented the ANC from using its majority to bully the opposition. It said the majority judgment “highlighted the importance of a motion of no confidence in the President as an instrument to hold the executive accountable”.

“The Constitutional Court declared that the National Assembly’s Rules ‘may not deny, frustrate, unreasonably delay or postpone the exercise of the right’ to debate a motion of no confidence. It also highlighted that this should be done within a reasonable time as the ‘motion deserves the serious and prompt attention of the responsible committee or committees of the Assembly’,” the DA said. The order to the Parliament to change the rules within six months was “the principle we believed was worth fighting for and we are vindicated in our belief,” the DA said.

Sisulu said the judgment was a victory for Parliament and welcomed the final settlement of this matter by the Constitutional Court. “Members are encouraged to use the review of the Rules process to make meaningful contribution and improve the Rules of the National Assembly rather than resorting to recurrent applications to the courts,” the Speaker said.

The crux of the majority judgment however was this: “A motion of no confidence in the President is a vital tool to advance our democratic hygiene. It affords the Assembly a vital power and duty to scrutinise and oversee executive action… The ever-present possibility of a motion of no confidence against the President and the Cabinet is meant to keep the President accountable to the Assembly which elects her or him.”

The court went on to say that this right is “central to the deliberative, multiparty democracy envisioned in the Constitution.”

“It implicates the values of democracy, transparency, accountability and openness. A motion of this kind is perhaps the most important mechanism that may be employed by Parliament to hold the executive to account, and to interrogate executive performance,” the judgment read.

This is a significant pronouncement by the Constitutional Court as it defines the mechanism by which the president could be held accountable. Up to now, it has been impossible to do so, or even to get a straight answer from Zuma on the many crises besieging his government.

Whether it is the poor performance of the economy, missing school books or the massacre of mineworkers by the police, the answers always lie deeply buried, which task teams or commissions of inquiry have to unearth. Even when it comes to renovations at his private home at Nkandla, the president is unable to provide answers. Accountability remains a moving target when it comes to the Zuma presidency.

Six out of 10 Constitutional Court judges decided that Parliament needs to be empowered to exercise oversight over the executive and that if the president is not able to perform the duties entrusted to him, there should be a mechanism to remove him from office. Four out of the ten judges however were happy to step behind the “separation of powers” shield and not intervene in matters relating to Parliament, even in a case where the rules were unconstitutional. In this case, they were outnumbered by those who felt there needed to be a constitutional safety net to ensure accountability.

“If a motion of no confidence in the President were to succeed, he or she and the incumbent Cabinet must resign. In effect, the people through their elected representatives in the Assembly would end the mandate they bestowed on an incumbent President,” the majority judgment read.

Of course this is all in theory. If the rules are amended timeously in accordance with the court deadline, there could still be a debate in Parliament on a motion of no confidence in the president before next year’s election. The vote, however, would fail going by the current political party representation in the National Assembly.

Considering that the president does not have to attend parliamentary sittings, Zuma would probably be absent in the event of such a debate and allow his party heavy-hitters to fight off the opposition. Even if the opposition parties make compelling arguments for his removal from office, Zuma will no doubt remain unscathed and bounce back as his party’s candidate for president in next year’s election.

The only instrument which can hold Zuma to account is that election. But Zuma is the ultimate political survivor and is bound to be back – carrying his Honorary Doctorate of Leadership and a copy of the amended rules of Parliament. DM

Photo: Chief Justice Mogoeng Mogoeng after holding a ceremonial court session for the late former Chief Justice Pius Langa at the Constitutional Court in Johannesburg, Tuesday, 27 August 2013. Picture: Werner Beukes/SAPA

Daily Maverick

 COMMENTS BY SONNY

Zuma may not even have a primary education but he placed his pawns well with the assistance of his

'back-room-boys!'

We are sure he cannot play Chess but has placed the pieces well.

He has avoided prison and has surrounded himself with bodyguards.

TRUE TRAITS OF A DESPOT DICTATOR IN THE MAKING!

THE WORLD IS WAITING TO PICK UP THE PIECES!!

WILL SOUTH AFRICA SURVIVE THIS ORDEAL?

Thuli Madonsela: Maladministration at the top of the Independent Electoral Commission

No Fear No Favour No Tender Fraud......



Greg Nicholson    27 AUGUST 2013  SOUTH AFRICA 00:27

                                                        NO CONSCIENCE?
When her business partner was vying to supply the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) with accommodation, Pansy Tlakula should have immediately recused herself from the process, said Public Protector Thuli Madonsela on Monday. Tlakula did the opposite. A new report shows how the head of the IEC risked its reputation when she was the organisation’s CEO. By GREG NICOLSON.

Everyone knew the IEC needed to leave Walker Street. After occupying the building for almost 13 years, the national office in Sunnyside, Pretoria, had become too small. The bathroom facilities couldn’t cope. Outside space was rented for meetings. Even the hallways were being used as offices. The rent was rapidly increasing. Simply put, the building was a health and safety hazard.

On 12 January 2009, the Commission, which consists of five members who run the country’s elections, decided the IEC would move to Menlyn Corporate Park. Soon to be built, it featured 9,059 square meters at the cost of R110.30 per square meter. It would have 300 covered parking spaces, not far off the N1, near schools and public transport routes.

Advocate Tlakula, then CEO, however, intervened. The decision to move to Menlyn hadn’t followed procurement policies and could cause an auditing problem. Besides, it was “too busy” for the IEC’s needs, she complained. Tlakula, who is now IEC chair, took control of finding a new home for the organisation.

She avoided one problematic move only to now stand accused by the Public Protector of “grossly irregular” procurement in another, characterised by “violation of procurement legislations and prescripts”. Less than a year from a national election, she has “risked the loss of public confidence in the Electoral Commission”, said Madonsela in her report into the IEC’s move to Riverside Office Park.

Tlakula suggested the procurement process start again. This time she would handle it through the executive committee. Before the Commission had even rescinded their decision on Menlyn, she had advertisements in the media calling for requests for proposal. Already the process was flawed; anything over R100,000 is supposed to be advertised for tender. Tlakula stayed heavily involved. As the chairperson of the executive committee and CEO of the institution, she effectively led both the initiation evaluation and adjudication of the bids.

Her team didn’t choose whom to award the contract to, but they submitted two options to the Commission. Menlyn Corporate Park was the first, which had previously been rejected due to the faulty process. Abland (Pty) Ltd’s building in Centurion was the other and it subsequently won the bid after outscoring Menlyn on the key criteria – price, location, square meters, age of building, car parking, access to motorway, proximity to shops and schools, and availability on 1 April 2010.

There were faults throughout the process. According to the Public Protector, apparently there was no set budget for the relocation. The procurement didn’t follow any of the available options and Madonsela found it constituted maladministration. But the organisation also struggled to stick to its own rules. The IEC judged bidders on whether their buildings would be ready by April 2010 but it did not move in to Abland’s Riverside Office Park until September that year, meaning some bidders like Mookoli were unfairly disadvantaged and others may have never applied.

Tlakula’s own failings led to a scathing review from the Public Protector. She is a director of Lehotsa Holdings, whose chairman and co-director is parliament’s standing committee on finance chairman Thaba Mufamadi. He is also the chairman of Manaka Property Investments, the BEE partner and 20% owner of Abland. In the past, Tlakula had introduced Mufamadi to colleagues as her business partner and there were rumours the two were in a romantic relationship. Madonsela concluded that Tlakula failed in her duties by not declaring the conflict of interest and recusing herself from the procurement process.

“During the evaluation of the bids by the executive committee, there was no way in which Tlakula could not have been aware of this fact as the evaluation and the adjudication of the proposals was done by the executive committee which included and was chaired by her,” found Madonsela. “Tlakula only declared her interest in Lehotsa Investments in the Commission’s annual and general declaration of interests forms in compliance with the annual financial disclosure framework which is a standard disclosure of interest form and which did not relate to a specific procurement transaction. This declaration said nothing about her business relationship with Hon Mufamadi. The declaration only covered Lehotsa as a company in which she has shares and not the names of her co-directors or shareholders.”

Tlakula maintains she has done nothing wrong. “How can I be conflicted in a company that I don’t have any interest in?” she asked on radio on Monday. She has a different definition of “conflict of interest”. Because her company did not have a direct interest in the bids and did not profit from awarding the contract to Abland, Tlakula argued the criticism was unfounded. Madonsela countered, “Such argument is in fact a source of concern. It would have been reasonably expected that the chairperson of a body such as the Electoral Commission should understand that things that can undermine objectivity transcend financial interests.” (The report suggests the two clashed regularly and at one point it accuses Tlakula of being “not entirely honest”.)

The money suggests Mufamadi benefited, even if Tlakula did not directly. In addition to being awarded the lucrative contract, Abland was paid millions for providing turnkey services to get the offices ready for use. It also got that contract without going through the necessary tender requirements.

For United Democratic Movement leader Bantu Holomisa, the report was a vindication. Along with anonymous IEC employees, he brought the issue to Madonsela in October 2011. “I’m of the opinion it would be difficult to retain her services. She would just be a liability given the damning report,” Holomisa told Daily Maverick. “The image of the IEC is gone.”

The Democratic Alliance (DA) also has its doubts. Its MP Manny de Freitas wants an urgent meeting with the portfolio committee on home affairs to discuss the matter. In the report, former chairperson and deputy chairperson of the Electoral Commission, Brigalia Bam and Thoko Mpumlwana both raised concerns that South Africa’s lauded institution could be tarnished.

Madonsela has recommended the speaker of Parliament consult the Electoral Committee on what action to take against Tlakula before advising the president on how to act. Parliament, the IEC and President Zuma now need to decide on whether to suspend Tlakula.

Madonsela also wants the Electoral Commission to review and possibly cancel the Abland lease and turnkey agreements and will ask the national treasury’s chief procurement officer to consider a forensic investigation. Signaling that the problems go beyond Tlakula, the Public Protector also suggested other role players in the Commission and IEC executive may need to be disciplined.

The institution responsible for ensuring free and fair elections now faces a deficit of trust. Madonsela titled her report “Inappropriate Moves”. Ahead of the 2014 vote, there’s not much time to move to restore the IEC’s credibility. DM

Photo: Electoral Commission CEO Pansy Tlakula is seen at a news conference at the Results Operations Centre in Pretoria, Monday, 16 May 2011 where she briefed reporters on the IEC's readiness for the local government elections. Picture: Werner Beukes/SAPA

Daily Maverick

Pansy, say it ain’t so

• sTEPHEN  grootes   27 AUG 2013 12:31 (SOUTH AFRICA)  00:31

Ever calm and thoughtful, Pansy Tlakula was a palate cleanser in South Africa’s often foul tasting political banquet. The possibility of her suspension from the Electoral Commission over a failure to disclose conflict of interest in a lease agreement would have enormous repercussions on the political landscape: the loss of a steadfast hand on the tiller of next year’s elections. By STEPHEN GROOTES.

I’m often asked if I’m ever driven to tears by our politics, and if so which emotion I feel at the time. There were plenty of occasions when the tears came from frustration, there’ve been others, more recently, when I simply felt fed up with an untenable and wrong situation. And there’ve been others when the tears come from laughter. But today, the tears are coming from disappointment. We have very few people in our public life we trust completely, who we must trust completely. And when one of them falls, we’re all that much weaker for it.

I’ve known Pansy Tlakula for many years. She may not know this of course, but I’ve been one of those people who have bugged her for a sound bite, called her at some unearthly hour of the morning begging for an explanation of some arcane electoral point. Sitting in a live radio studio, waiting for the green light indicating her phone line was connected, the calm would immediately descend. Good, calm radio was on its way, delivered by someone who really has natural authority. If she were speaking at a conference, I’d stay.

And I was always rewarded. There was always something. Something that made you realise, in this country, this South Africa, there are people who really are impressive. Clever. Thoughtful. Able to deal with anything. She was one of those people who, when the chips were down, when you’d been following Julius Malema for a full week, could somehow cleanse your political palate in five minutes. You realised we were all going to be all right, because she was in charge, she would make sure everything worked properly.

Everything she touched, worked. Periodically, I would find myself in the cavernous election results centre at the Pretoria Showgrounds, surrounded by hundreds of my colleagues, all jostling, competing, laughing and gossiping. These were my happiest days as a journalist. Politicians you’ve been on the campaign trail with hugging you, Gwede explaining in great and excruciating detail why your predictions were wrong, Zwelinzima (may he now campaign in peace) laughing with you, Blade cracking jokes. And the numbers are coming in. The new political playing field is being set for the next five years. Power is being assigned. The people have spoken, and now the great listening begins.

The person at the centre of all this since 2002 has been Pansy Tlakula. She’s been organising these amazing gatherings of South Africans, from Umgeni to Umhlanga, from Tembisa to Houghton, everyone would gather in the same place, at the same time, to do the same thing. Knowing that their vote would count, properly. Trusting the people in charge.

And now we all feel let down. Because of some stupid building lease. Because Tlakula, who as an advocate, really really really should know better, didn’t disclose conflicts of interest. Because when the Public Protector came knocking, the IEC’s top officials didn’t respond properly. They didn’t hand over all the information that was needed. They didn’t just put their hands up and promise to deal with everything immediately and at once. Instead, expensive lawyers were involved.

It’s one of those moments when you feel the stuffing being knocked out of you. When the ground moves because everything you thought you knew is no more. It’s when you realise there really was a political conspiracy against President Jacob Zuma, or that no one will be punished for Waterkloof Air Force Base, or that the DA now controls a town in the North West. You suddenly have to question everything else you thought you knew.

It’s horrid.

What’s worse is what could follow. Under the Constitution, as Thuli Madonsela points out in her report the Electoral Commission (without Tlakula) and the speaker, Max Sisulu, now have to get together to work out what to do. Their advice goes to the President. Already, the DA and the United Democratic Movement (it was UDM leader Bantu Holomisa who laid the original complaint here) have already asked for Tlakula to be suspended.

It’s hard to argue against them. Quite frankly, if I had to pick between a dishonest chief judge and a dishonest IEC chair, I’d pick the judge. Some things have to be sacrosanct. Like Caesar’s wife, the head of the IEC has to be purer than pure, above reproach, better than all of us. Not someone who cocks up a bloody lease agreement. I mean really. Who does that? Bheki Cele?

So now Zuma will have to decide what to do. And the real question will be, as it always is in politics, if Tlakula goes who will replace her.

Here’s a little homework for you. Think of five South Africans who are neutral enough, respected enough, authoritative enough, and trusted enough to do that job. People who everyone, from the EFF and Agang, to the ANC and the DA, through to the Freedom Front Plus and the IFP will trust.

Still thinking? Me too.

And now, Zuma might have to find someone, just months before an election. As parties have already started to campaign, as people are already considering how to win this group over, and how to stop that group wearing blue shirts. When, already, politicians have started to lose their marbles.

Normally, you would simply pick someone else from the Electoral Commission to take over. But several of their number also don’t come out of this smelling particularly good. So some more thinking may be required.

There will now be some, those with their eyes very much on what happened up north recently, who will already start to question whether next year’s elections here will be credible. I won’t be one of them. I will miss Pansy Tlakula, sure. I will miss her steadiness and her firm hand on the unpredictable tiller that is this country at election time. But the processes in place at the IEC, the other people who are there, have grown in her image. The image I had of her before I read Madonsela’s report. I have faith in them. I have faith in the institution.

I also have faith in another fact, a process I know to be true. It’s that if you think a service delivery protest can be bad, it will be nothing compared to the anger of this electorate should it feel its vote has been scorned, has been trifled with, treated Zanu-PF style.

So next year’s elections will happen, on time. They will be credible. They will be well run. But probably not by Tlakula. DM

Grootes is the host of the Midday Report on Talk Radio 702 and 567 Cape Talk, and the Senior Political Correspondent for Eyewitness News. He’s been part of the political hack pack since before the Polokwane Tsunami, and covers politics in a slightly obsessive manner. Those who love him have recommended help for his politics addiction. He quotes Amy Winehouse.

Photo: Electoral Commission CEO Pansy Tlakula speaks at a news conference at the Results Operations Centre in Pretoria, Monday, 16 May 2011 on the IEC's readiness for the local government elections. Picture: Werner Beukes/SAPA

DAILY MAVERICK

COMMENTS BY SONNY

TRUE ANC/ /SACP CADRE - THEY CANNOT ACCEPT  THE TRUTH EVEN WHEN THEY CROSS THE

LINE.

ROGUE POLITICIANS BENT ON CRIME AND FRAUD.

SHE IS THE ONE WHO IS GOING TO LEAD THE ANC THROUGH THE NEXT FREE AND FAIR 

ELECTIONS COME 2014.

YOU CAN EXPECT ANOTHER 'ZIMBABWE RIGGING' OF THE POLLS / VOTES!