South African parliament passes controversial appropriation bill
The announcement was made during a sitting at the Cape Town International Convention Centre on Wednesday.
The sitting included the tabling of the Standing Committee on Appropriations' report, a debate, departmental budget votes, and the second reading of the bill - the final step required to pass the national budget.
Voting was conducted manually, with party whips announcing how their members voted. Individual MPs were allowed to indicate if they wished to vote differently from their party, though none did.
A quorum of 201 MPs was required for the vote, as the National Assembly consists of 400 members. The Appropriation Bill needed a simple majority – at least 201 votes to pass.
The African National Congress (ANC), which holds 159 seats, was joined by the DA with 87 seats, IFP 12, Patriotic Alliance with 9, Freedom Front Plus with 5, ActionSA with 5, African Christian Democratic Party with two, United Democratic Movement with two, Rise Mzansi with two, BOSA with two, Al Jama-ah with one, Pan Africanist Congress with one, and GOOD Party with one in supporting the bill.
The final vote tally was 262 in favor, 90 against, and no abstentions. The bill was then approved.
Among the votes against were MK Party with 51 votes), EFF with 36, ATM with one, National Coloured Congress with one and United Africans Transformation with one.
A minor controversy arose during the voting process when Al Jama-ah leader Ganief Hendricks claimed both party members were present and had voted. It was later revealed he was alone.
'My apologies, honorable deputy Speaker, he may have been stuck in the toilet,' Hendricks said.
EFF MP Marshall Dlamini called for Hendricks to be referred to the ethics committee for allegedly misleading the House.
Deputy Speaker Annelie Lotriet responded that it was inappropriate to accuse a member of lying without due process, stating Dlamini's comment breached parliamentary rules.
Earlier in the session, EFF MP Omphile Maotwe said the party would reject the bill, accusing DA federal chairperson Helen Zille of using the national budget as a political weapon within the Government of National Unity (GNU).
'For the supervisors in the government on neoliberal unity, led by the chief supervisor Ms. Helen Zille, the budget is the tool to fight political squabbles,' Maotwe said.
The DA had previously threatened to block the bill unless President Cyril Ramaphosa took action against then-Higher Education Minister Dr. Nobuhle Nkabane, whom the party accused of misleading Parliament over appointments to Sector Education and Training Authority (SETA) boards.
Ramaphosa dismissed Nkabane earlier this week, appointing former Deputy Minister Buti Manamela as her replacement, and named former KwaZulu-Natal Premier Dr. Nomusa Dube-Ncube as the new deputy minister.
The DA said it supported the bill following these changes. Lotriet formally announced the results: 'The results are as follows: Yes 262, No 90, no abstentions.' She then ordered that the bill be read for the first time.
First published by IOL
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