Last week the National Assembly voted in favour of a parliamentary inquiry into the competence of Busisiwe Mkwebane. This followed a report by an independent panel, chaired by former Constitutional Court justice Bess Nkabinde. They found that there was prima facie evidence of misconduct and incompetence - enough for a parliamentary committee to investigate whether she should be removed.

The important point here is that the appointment and work of this independent committee were according to rules which were adopted by the National Assembly (with the support of the ANC) last year. It is only the initial phase. Nothing has been decided yet. That would be up to the parliamentary committee in which the ANC would have the majority vote.

Simple right?

Apparently not.

All hell broke loose in the ANC ranks last week.  

First a few MP's spoke openly about their disagreement with the proposed vote. This necessitated Gwede Mantashe and Paul Mashatile addressing the ANC parliamentary caucus and instructing them to vote for the motion.  

Then on the day of the vote, despite a three-line whip (which means that unless you are dead or in hospital you must be available to vote), 60 ANC members were not present.  (The ANC later said that they all had valid excuses, but forgive me for being slightly skeptical about that one.)

It is of course not the first time that ANC members have broken a three-line whip and ANC directive on how to vote. The first one was Jennifer Ferguson, who abstained during the so-called abortion legislation. Ben Turok famously walked out prior to the vote on the Secrecy Act and Pregs Govender broke ranks to be the only ANC member to vote against the arms deal contract during the SA Defense Budget vote.

In all these instances the ANC handled it with a strong arm - publicly denouncing their actions and calling them to account.

The exact opposite happened last week.

When asked if there were going to be repercussions for those who were absent, the secretary-general of the ANC, Ace Magashule, responded: “What repercussions when they have done the right thing?” 

Magashule and those objecting to the vote claim that they could not support a DA motion. The fact is that it wasn’t a DA motion. It is true that the DA originally tabled the complaints against the public protector. However,  the vote was to adopt the report (which included recommendations) by the independent committee which was  - as stated earlier - set up according to the rules of parliament and adopted through a vote which the ANC supported. Reports such as these get tabled by parliament- not a specific political party - for members to vote on.

So it had zero to do with the DA.

These details either passed Ace Magashule by or he deliberately ignored them. Instead, during an interview with Gigasi FM, he claimed that a foreign culture had been creeping into the ANC which, according to him, had long taken a principled position never to support any motion tabled by opposition parties.

You are welcome to share an exasperated groan with me.

As stated above, the actual vote last week had nothing to do with the DA, but even if it did, so what?  

I don’t believe that there had been a formal decision by the ANC to never vote with the opposition.

In fact, during the first few years in parliament, we almost always tried to build consensus. Compromises were made and only on rare occasions did the ANC use its significant majority to push things through. A practice of voting against anything the opposition placed on the table might have developed over the years, but that is not the same as a formal decision by the NEC or elective conference of the ANC.

What really irks me is the fact that this is just another illustration of the party-above-anything-else attitude of many in the ANC. The courts have set aside numbers of Busisiwe Mkwebane’s reports. The judgements were scathing, and she has even been ordered to carry some of the legal fees personally – a damning condemnation by the judiciary. 

It is clear as daylight that this investigation needs to happen for the sake of the country and our hard-fought-for democracy, irrespective of who started the process.  

The ANC does not have exclusive insight or knowledge into what is right and good for the country – far from it. It is surely conceivable that an opposition party might have some good ideas from time to time and that a responsible governing party would not shoot them down just because of where they originated?

It is important to note that the DA is also not totally innocent in this regard. According to someone in the know, ANC people went to the DA  when the original complaint was made and asked them to withdraw it in order to allow the ANC to initiate the process. According to my friend, the DA’s response was: “Why would we do that? What is in it for the DA?”

Time for another exasperated groan!

Of course, the answer is: to do something for the good of the country!

Wouldn’t it be nice if politicians of all parties remembered from time-to-time that this is why we put them there?