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Eyewitness News
2 days ago
- Politics
- Eyewitness News
Limited period for political parties to review their candidate lists to fill National Assembly vacancies
CAPE TOWN - The window has opened for a limited period for political parties to review the candidate lists used to fill vacancies in the National Assembly. Of particular interest during this window, is the Umkhonto we Sizwe Party, which has for the past year not filled all of its 58 seats owing to disputes over its lists which have led to court battles and the mass removal of names from its lists. In the first of two opportunities for this year, political parties have until Thursday to make changes. The Electoral Act makes provision for two review opportunities in the second year after an election, the first being a seven-day period which started on Friday, the day marking a year since members were designated to the assembly. Parliament said that during the first period, parties will be able to supplement their lists to fill all existing vacancies. It may also replace no more than 25 percent of those appearing on the list and also change the order in which they appear in the line of succession. After that, political parties will only be able to tinker with their lists until 12 June 2026. Currently, the official opposition has the most vacancies. MK Party Spokesperson Nhlamulo Ndhlela has indicated the party plans to fill eight seats. Last week the party announced after axing Floyd Shivambu as secretary general, that he's due to make a return to Parliament. However Parliament said that the party is yet to submit any changes it plans to make, and the speaker is not scheduled to administer the oath to any new MPs this week.
The South African
03-06-2025
- General
- The South African
MK Party axes Floyd Shivambu as Secretary General
The Umkhonto weSizwe Party (MKP) has removed Floyd Shivambu as Secretary-General. The party took action after Shivambu travelled to Malawi over Easter to attend a service at Shepherd Bushiri's church. Bushiri is a fugitive. He and his wife, Mary, fled South Africa in 2020 while out on bail. They face charges of fraud and money laundering. In March this year, Malawi's courts approved South Africa's request to extradite them. In a media statement, the party said Shivambu's visit was unauthorised. He travelled without informing the party or the President. The statement said his actions violated the MK Party's constitution. Officials cited Section 3(j), which forbids international trips that go against the party's agenda. President Jacob Zuma met with MK leaders on 2 June. After long discussions, they agreed that Shivambu's trip compromised the party's values and image. The party said the trip was not part of any official programme and that they had received concerns from civil society. Officials confirmed that Shivambu will now serve as a Member of Parliament. They said he has experience and will add value in his new role. Shivambu accepted the redeployment. The MK Party thanked him for his previous work. He served both as Secretary-General and National Organiser and praised his skills, but said discipline comes first. Let us know by leaving a comment below or send a WhatsApp to 060 011 021 1. Subscribe to The South African website's newsletters and follow us on WhatsApp, Facebook, X, and Bluesky for the latest news.
IOL News
03-06-2025
- Business
- IOL News
Zuma's legal battle: Pietermaritzburg High Court dismisses Thales' defence
Jacob Zuma's attempt to escape prosecution failed. Image: Independent Media Jacob Zuma's hopes to escape the arms deal criminal trial were on Tuesday thwarted at the Pietermaritzburg High Court, which ruled that the argument by his co-accused, arms manufacturer Thales, was not convincing. The former president, who is now the leader of the Umkhonto weSizwe Party (MKP), had piggybacked on the French arms manufacturer to escape prosecution. Thales's legal team had, on April 24, advanced an argument that continuing with the trial would be constitutionally unfair since their client's former directors, Pierre Moynto and Alain Thetard, who were its prime witnesses, had died. In looking for its permanent stay of prosecution, Thales also argued that even documented evidence was no longer available due to the delay of the trial. Video Player is loading. Play Video Play Unmute Current Time 0:00 / Duration -:- Loaded : 0% Stream Type LIVE Seek to live, currently behind live LIVE Remaining Time - 0:00 This is a modal window. Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window. 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 ✕ Ad loading Dismissing the application, which Zuma's lawyers, led by Advocate Dali Mpofu, supported, Judge Nkosinathi Chili said Thales had not told the court that Moynto and Thetard would have come to testify had they been still alive. 'The question of whether they would prejudice, which might result in Thales not receiving a constitutionally fair trial, is a matter for the trial court at least for assessment, as and when it arises, if it does arise. 'Whether the right to a fair trial is infringed, the matter would be best decided by the court,' said Chili. He said it was the State, not the accused, who should prove his or her innocence, and all that would be expected of Thales would be to advance a version that would be reasonably true.
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Ramaphosa Was Set up To Fail With Trump
President of South Africa Cyril Ramaphosa speaks as U.S. President Donald Trump listens during a meeting in the Oval Office of the White House on May 21, 2025 in Washington, DC. Credit - Chip Somodevilla—Getty Images When the UK's prime minister Keir Starmer visited the White House in February, he charmed Donald Trump with an invitation from the British King Charles, playing to the president's notorious vanity. But South Africa doesn't have quite the same cache of soft power to draw from. The best the country's president Cyril Ramaphosa could bring when he visited the White House today was two white South African golfing legends much admired by Trump, Ernie Els and Retief Goosen. Trump received the golfers gratefully, showering them with praise. Then, he turned on Ramaphosa. As the two presidents took questions from the press, the lights dimmed and Ramaphosa found himself watching prepared videos of the leaders of South Africa's two populist parties, the Economic Freedom Fighters and the Umkhonto we Sizwe Party, chanting slogans about killing white farmers. Next came an image of a thousand white crosses, a memorial to the dead. It was reminiscent of the demeaning treatment Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky received when he visited the White House. Only this time, Trump's ambush was far more clearly choreographed, and thus somewhat less unstylish. Ramaphosa had a piece of bait dangled before his nose. He was made to watch what Trump took to be evidence that the South African government was presiding over the slaughter of white Afrikaners. Ramaphosa did not take the bait. He held his composure and mustered a skillful response. But he hardly came out well. The show Trump had staged only allowed for two possible stories. One was that a genocide of white farmers was taking place. The other was that crime was out of control in South Africa and that the country needed help. Ramaphosa told the latter story. In the circumstances, it was the best he could do. And it is surely right. More than 26,000 people are murdered in South Africa every year. For a country of 64 million people that is simply staggering. Its per capita murder rate is nearly nine times higher than the United States's and seven times higher than Kenya's. Who are these 26,000 people? The best studies available show that the majority are Black and mixed-race men between the ages of 15 and 44, and that most are either un- or under-employed. Being murdered is thus an experience largely monopolised by the young and the poor. And precisely because they are poor, their violent deaths neither threaten political stability at home nor make news abroad. In a grim, horrible sense, their corpses are weightless on the international political scales. But the young and the poor are not the only victims of awful crimes. South Africa is violent enough for nastiness to stream out of the ghettos and into the suburbs, and, indeed, onto the farms. There are many middle-class experiences of horror in South Africa, and unlike the poor, what happens to middle-class people is weighty enough to be packaged and sold to audiences abroad. The false narrative of a genocide of white people in South Africa is thus truly perverse; the murders of whites are the visible crust under which lies a veritable carnage of young Black men. That is more or less what Ramaphosa and his delegation tried to tell Trump. We do not need your opprobrium, they said; we need your help. Our police stations need your technology to fight crime; our people need your economy to invest in ours so that fewer young men are violently idle and more are employed. And to be fair to Ramaphosa, the chorus he conducted was deft. He got his agriculture minister, John Steenhuizen, a white man and the leader of a large opposition party, to speak eloquently on these matters. The billionaire South African businessman, Johann Rupert, spoke forcefully too. Between them they presented a unified, multi-racial front. They pointed out that South Africa was a constitutional democracy in which extremist parties were free to provoke; that the state had not confiscated anyone's land since the advent of democracy; that the idea of a racial genocide was grievously mistaken. But for all that, Ramaphosa's performance was painful to watch. For he was reduced to saying that he presided over a country that had lost control over itself and required assistance. And not just from any country, but from the United States, which made the humiliation all the more painful. South Africa's relationship with the United States is ever so fraught. For many decades now, the country has been saturated in American culture. Its highway system and its suburban sprawl are inspired by post-war America. Its daytime television soap operas and its prime-time dramas are templates of American originals. In Cape Town's ghettos, street gangs distinguish between themselves via rival allegiances to East Coast and West Coast rap. A country at the tip of a continent thousands of miles from U.S. shores, South Africa is testimony to the power and the reach of the cultural hegemony America has exercised over the world. And that renders South Africa's relationship to America brittle, testy, and complicated. To be the one to go to the White House saying that we are drowning and need your help is not the way any South African president would want to be remembered. But given the cards Ramaphosa was dealt, it was the best hand he could play. Contact us at letters@
Time Magazine
22-05-2025
- Politics
- Time Magazine
Ramaphosa Was Set up To Fail With Trump
When the UK's prime minister Keir Starmer visited the White House in February, he charmed Donald Trump with an invitation from the British King Charles, playing to the president's notorious vanity. But South Africa doesn't have quite the same cache of soft power to draw from. The best the country's president Cyril Ramaphosa could bring when he visited the White House today was two white South African golfing legends much admired by Trump, Ernie Els and Retief Goosen. Trump received the golfers gratefully, showering them with praise. Then, he turned on Ramaphosa. As the two presidents took questions from the press, the lights dimmed and Ramaphosa found himself watching prepared videos of the leaders of South Africa's two populist parties, the Economic Freedom Fighters and the Umkhonto we Sizwe Party, chanting slogans about killing white farmers. Next came an image of a thousand white crosses, a memorial to the dead. It was reminiscent of the demeaning treatment Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky received when he visited the White House. Only this time, Trump's ambush was far more clearly choreographed, and thus somewhat less unstylish. Ramaphosa had a piece of bait dangled before his nose. He was made to watch what Trump took to be evidence that the South African government was presiding over the slaughter of white Afrikaners. Ramaphosa did not take the bait. He held his composure and mustered a skillful response. But he hardly came out well. The show Trump had staged only allowed for two possible stories. One was that a genocide of white farmers was taking place. The other was that crime was out of control in South Africa and that the country needed help. Ramaphosa told the latter story. In the circumstances, it was the best he could do. And it is surely right. More than 26,000 people are murdered in South Africa every year. For a country of 64 million people that is simply staggering. Its per capita murder rate is nearly nine times higher than the United States's and seven times higher than Kenya's. Who are these 26,000 people? The best studies available show that the majority are Black and mixed-race men between the ages of 15 and 44, and that most are either un- or under-employed. Being murdered is thus an experience largely monopolised by the young and the poor. And precisely because they are poor, their violent deaths neither threaten political stability at home nor make news abroad. In a grim, horrible sense, their corpses are weightless on the international political scales. But the young and the poor are not the only victims of awful crimes. South Africa is violent enough for nastiness to stream out of the ghettos and into the suburbs, and, indeed, onto the farms. There are many middle-class experiences of horror in South Africa, and unlike the poor, what happens to middle-class people is weighty enough to be packaged and sold to audiences abroad. The false narrative of a genocide of white people in South Africa is thus truly perverse; the murders of whites are the visible crust under which lies a veritable carnage of young Black men. That is more or less what Ramaphosa and his delegation tried to tell Trump. We do not need your opprobrium, they said; we need your help. Our police stations need your technology to fight crime; our people need your economy to invest in ours so that fewer young men are violently idle and more are employed. And to be fair to Ramaphosa, the chorus he conducted was deft. He got his agriculture minister, John Steenhuizen, a white man and the leader of a large opposition party, to speak eloquently on these matters. The billionaire South African businessman, Johann Rupert, spoke forcefully too. Between them they presented a unified, multi-racial front. They pointed out that South Africa was a constitutional democracy in which extremist parties were free to provoke; that the state had not confiscated anyone's land since the advent of democracy; that the idea of a racial genocide was grievously mistaken. But for all that, Ramaphosa's performance was painful to watch. For he was reduced to saying that he presided over a country that had lost control over itself and required assistance. And not just from any country, but from the United States, which made the humiliation all the more painful. South Africa's relationship with the United States is ever so fraught. For many decades now, the country has been saturated in American culture. Its highway system and its suburban sprawl are inspired by post-war America. Its daytime television soap operas and its prime-time dramas are templates of American originals. In Cape Town's ghettos, street gangs distinguish between themselves via rival allegiances to East Coast and West Coast rap. A country at the tip of a continent thousands of miles from U.S. shores, South Africa is testimony to the power and the reach of the cultural hegemony America has exercised over the world. And that renders South Africa's relationship to America brittle, testy, and complicated. To be the one to go to the White House saying that we are drowning and need your help is not the way any South African president would want to be remembered. But given the cards Ramaphosa was dealt, it was the best hand he could play.
