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Testify, don't toyi-toyi, David Mabuza tells opposition parties

Deputy President David Mabuza says if people want to help the inquiry into state capture they should ask to testify rather than demonstrate outside.
Deputy President David Mabuza says if people want to help the inquiry into state capture they should ask to testify rather than demonstrate outside.
Image: Masi Losi

Deputy President David Mabuza has suggested that MPs from opposition parties were interfering with the operations of the state capture commission by demanding which current and former minister should appear before it.

Mabuza was responding to an oral question from DA chief whip John Steenhuisen, which he also addressed to Mabuza in his other capacity as the patron of the moral regeneration movement.

Mabuza said opposition MPs should testify before the Zondo commission instead of dictating from outside how it should do its work.

Steenhuisen wanted to know what steps Mabuza had taken, as leader of the moral regeneration movement, to encourage current and former cabinet ministers to make full disclosures to the judicial commission of inquiry into state capture, headed by chief justice Raymond Zondo.

But the deputy president said doing so would amount to political interference with the work of the commission.

"It will be wrong of us here in this house to start discussing statements that are said in the commission because that is a judicial commission. We can’t compromise this process by doing something parallel this side, discussing what is said in the commission.

"If we want this commission to produce the correct results, let's not interfere," said Mabuza, before taking an indirect swipe at the EFF and the DA for holding protests outside the venue of the Zondo commission.

"If we want to support it, go and make a statement there, in that way you’re supporting it. I don't know if you go outside where the commission is holding this inquiry and toyi-toyi, where you're sending a message, or you must go inside and make a statement. So I'm encouraging all people [to testify]."

Mabuza also declined to respond to a question from Mbuyiseni Ndlozi of the EFF, who asked him if he received any private funding for the ANC deputy presidency in the run- up to the party's elective conference at Nasrec last year.

This comes after President Cyril Ramaphosa revealed last week that his bid for the ANC presidency had been partly funded by a controversial government service provider, Bosasa, to the tune of R500,000 — but that it happened without his knowledge.

Mabuza said Ndlozi's question was not relevant to the topics under discussion.

"Your question is a new question and I don't think it's relevant. If you insist on the question put it [in writing]. If it's agreed to by your programming committee, I will be duty-bound to answer.

"But this time it's regarded as a new question and it involves the ANC. I'm not the treasurer, I am not the spokesperson of the ANC, but if you insist on the question put it in writing."


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