EFF accuses Speaker and GNU government of trying to rubber stamp committee probing Lt-Gen Mkhwanazi's claims

The National Assembly Speaker, Thoko Didiza, has been slammed by the EFF’s Leigh-Ann Mathys, a member of Parliament’s Ad Hoc Committee investigating allegations made by KwaZulu-Natal Police Commissioner Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi over defanging the committee.

Mathys had unleashed her during proceedings on Wednesday, for the delay in issuing subpoenas for the appearance of Paul O'Sullivan and Brown Mogotsi, and for how they had come up with excuses for various delays.

Mogotsi demanded that Parliament pay for his security detail before he appeared before the Ad Hoc Committee. O'Sullivan has also made requests that he appear virtually before the committee.

The committee has maintained that it will not tolerate a situation in which a witness dictates how they want to appear.

Mathys, speaking on the side of the committee hearings, said that the deeper issue with O'Sullivan and Mogotsi, “is that we have a GNU-run Parliament in the name of the ANC, who is the Speaker, and the Deputy Speaker who is the DA”.

“Neither of them has made a single appearance yet, not even once, just to even come and greet us. We've been here for almost 4 months. Nothing,” Mathys said.

“The EFF, with our party leader, Honourable (Julius) Malema, wrote to the Speaker when we started this committee to say that we do not have proper resources to be able to have a committee, and a report after we are done here, which is going to affect change in the criminal justice system.

“She hasn't even bothered to acknowledge that she received that letter. Up to this very day, we have consistently been raising the issue about having a forensic investigator.

“Right now, we would have already known if Paul O'Sullivan is even in the country or not in the country, but we can't. We have a lousy three members in our legal team doing all these statements. How does that even work? And we've been asking for that to be beefed up for the longest time.

“This is a deliberate effort by this GNU-run Parliament that we end up with just a rubber stamp. They want to appear that we've done something to deal with the criminal justice system, but it's not gonna be anything. It's gonna just collect dust. We don't know why the Speaker has no interest in some bringing through Paul O’Sullivan,” Mathys said.

“It can’t take that long because we made this request almost 2 weeks ago. What is the problem? Where is she, and what exactly is it that she's doing? What is more important than us fixing our criminal justice system here in the, in the country?

“Is she not even watching some of this committee sometimes and then saying, ‘Oh, okay, what's going on? We need to do X, Y, and Z’. Worse than that, Paul O'Sullivan threatened a witness while we were sitting here, and she has done absolutely nothing about it,” Mathys said.

“So, is she also conflicted? Do we have a Speaker who is aligned with a particular faction in the criminal justice system or whatever it is? That's the question that we must ask because she's done absolutely nothing about it. This is her home; she's supposed to lead, and she should be protecting each one of us. (Yet) Nothing.”

Spokesperson for the Office of the Speaker, Reggie Ngcobo, said that the comments from Mathys are unfortunate.

“Firstly, the request to subpoena Mr O'Sullivan was not sent to the Speaker, but the committee asked Parliament Legal Services to provide it with a legal opinion, not the Speaker. Secondly, on Mr Mogotsi, nothing has been sent to the Speaker by the committee, and thirdly, the Speaker appointed this committee to do its work independently and without any interference.

“It's indeed so unfortunate and opportunistic to claim that the Speaker is conflicted or is aligned to any faction,” Ngcobo said.

“The question is, what faction is she referring to? The Speaker does not even know who gets called to appear before the committee. Honourable Mathys' comments are misleading and unfounded.

“I think Honourable Mathys is trying to be relevant for no reason. I really don't understand what is conflicting? The Speaker is not conflicted in any way. She's the Speaker who assigned them,” Ngcobo said.

“I don't know whether she is trying to be relevant, but from our side, we find these comments so unfortunate.”

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