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EFF makes request for free venue to carry out Madlanga commission

EFF makes request for free venue to carry out Madlanga commission

Eyewitness News18 hours ago
JOHANNESBURG -The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) have written a letter to the Deputy Chief Justice Mbuyiseli Madlanga, calling for cheaper venue options for the Judicial Commission of Inquiry that will probe corruption and political interference within the criminal justice system.
The commission, set to begin this month, will investigate explosive allegations by KwaZulu- Natal Police Commissioner Nhlanhla Mkhwanazi implicating among other top officials, now- suspended Police Minister Senzo Mchunu
In its letter, the EFF argues the country has already spent too much money on previous commissions, including the state capture inquiry.
[WATCH] The Madlanga Commission: Meet the legal and investigative team
EFF member of Parliament (MP) Mazwi Blose said they have offered alternatives.
'We are being proactive because we draw inspiration, or we draw lessons from the Zondo commission. We really wasted close to a billion rand of State money, that could have been utilised better in providing services for our people.'
Blose said they must find a venue that will not cost taxpayers money.
'Let's go find a venue which is not going to cost taxpayers money, and which is actually going to be free, because state institutions do have venues, we've got community halls, civic centres, public works, we've got facilities that must be made available.'
READ MORE
• Madlanga inquiry: Application for evidence to be heard in-camera won't be granted easily
• Madlanga Commission of Inquiry to work hard to meet deadlines set by Ramaphosa
• Judicial commission of inquiry probing criminality in justice system to begin in August
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Shivambu: EFF's disruptive behaviour in Parliament was childish' and ‘senseless,' that's why l left
Shivambu: EFF's disruptive behaviour in Parliament was childish' and ‘senseless,' that's why l left

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timean hour ago

  • IOL News

Shivambu: EFF's disruptive behaviour in Parliament was childish' and ‘senseless,' that's why l left

Former Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) deputy president Floyd Shivambu says he was never comfortable with the party's disruptive behaviour in Parliament during his decade-long tenure, calling it 'childish' and without purpose. Image: Phando Jikelo Former Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) deputy president Floyd Shivambu says he was never comfortable with the party's disruptive behaviour in Parliament during his decade-long tenure, calling it 'childish' and without purpose. Shivambu, who is now the national convenor of the Mayibuye Consultation Process, said on Thursday that even if the uMkhonto weSizwe (MK) Party had not existed, he would have still left the EFF. 'One of the things I was not comfortable with throughout my 10 years in Parliament was the culture of disruption and rootedness that characterised those we served with,' he said during an event in Midrand. 'All of those things were just planned, like in a childish way, with no purpose.' 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Text Color White Black Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Transparent Window Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Transparent Semi-Transparent Opaque Font Size 50% 75% 100% 125% 150% 175% 200% 300% 400% Text Edge Style None Raised Depressed Uniform Dropshadow Font Family Proportional Sans-Serif Monospace Sans-Serif Proportional Serif Monospace Serif Casual Script Small Caps Reset restore all settings to the default values Done Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window. Advertisement Next Stay Close ✕ MK Party leader Jacob Zuma later announced that Shivambu would be redeployed to Parliament, but that never materialised. Instead, he found himself sidelined. Although Shivambu briefly joined the MK Party, he left within a short period, citing misalignment with its direction. 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ANC members no longer allowed to chant 'Kill the Boer', says Mbalula
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ANC members no longer allowed to chant 'Kill the Boer', says Mbalula

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AmaBhungane bids to challenge the Public Procurement Act
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Procurement is the ground-zero of corruption and State Capture – that's why we are heading for the Constitutional Court. It's unlikely that you'll open any newspaper or scroll through a news website these days without seeing an article about corruption in a government tender process. Just this week, we read about how the CEO of Independent Development Trust tried to quash a story by promising Daily Maverick investigative journalist Pieter-Louis Myburgh that they could facilitate tenders for him and his contacts, and about how an ANC leader and KwaZulu-Natal Education MEC Sipho Hlomuka feels that criticisms about his wives benefiting from government tenders are an attempt to target him politically. Corruption has become endemic to South African public life, and procurement – the process by which government contracts for goods and services – is the abused cash-cow that feeds political and personal greed. We all know it. 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Or was it because any possibility of 'turning off the taps to tender corruption', as Judge Zondo so neatly put it, would hurt them all financially and politically? We have been following, participating in and writing on the development of the Public Procurement Act since 2020. At every possible stage, we have voiced our deep concerns that the system the Act creates does not contain sufficient safeguards. We fumed when Parliament rushed through the Bill before last year's elections, furious at the laughably short timeframes the MPs had to consider the draft Bill and the public submissions. We formally wrote to the President and asked him to consider sending the Bill back to the National Assembly to address what we (and our colleagues in the Procurement Reform Working Group) described as patently unconstitutional provisions. We were ignored. 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We explain how representatives from National Treasury were responsible for collating the public submissions and presenting commentary on those submissions to Parliament – and how they admitted that they had considered only about 30% of the submissions received. We explain how one key chapter in the Bill – that on preferential procurement – was added after the submissions were received and so received no meaningful public engagement in the National Assembly. We explain how the MPs on the Standing Committee on Finance held oral hearings on the Bill only one day after receiving the written submissions from the public, and that even the Chair of the National Council of Provinces expressed concern that the Bill was being rushed through Parliament before the 2024 elections. We explain how key issues raised in the public submissions were merely 'noted' by MPs and never engaged with. We submit that the Bill should never have been passed in the way it was and that Parliament clearly violated its constitutional obligations to ensure the public has a meaningful opportunity to influence the content of legislation. To us, this is an existential fight. The country cannot accommodate the current level of corruption in our public administration and cannot allow these levels to become normal and unremarked on. The Public Procurement Act takes a 'business as usual' approach: granting officials excessive discretion, resisting the medicine of transparency and relying excessively on the Treasury to police the system – an approach that has demonstrably failed. Crucially, the Act fails to provide strong mechanisms for proactive disclosure of procurement information to enable monitoring for the public interest. This perpetuates the dark fog in government procurement, making it a ripe environment for abuse. We at amaBhungane refuse to accept that corruption is simply the route to doing business with the state, and we will continue to challenge the procurement frameworks that facilitate and legitimise this form of business. Our application to join the cases challenging the manner in which the Act was adopted is merely the next (big) step in our long journey.

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