SENATORS AYANHLANHLATSEKA INDEED!

The ire of the senators was apparently triggered by what they perceived were delays in the passage of the Appropriation Bill in the House of Assembly that Finance Minister Neal Rijkenberg had blamed on a secret political clique that wanted to cause anarchy.

A secret political clique? That is taking matters to the extreme even to a mind with fertile imagination. And there is no doubting that the choice of words, or rather label, is meant to profile and whip up emotions of the people to distance themselves from and isolate those MPs fingered to be orchestrating the so-called anarchy and political crisis. And we all know who the MPs against whom the senators were deduced from the motions they had successfully moved thus delaying the passage of the government’s budget; Hosea MP Mduduzi Bacede Mabuza and Siphofaneni MP Mduduzi ‘Gaw’zela’ Simelane and lately Deputy Speaker and Matsanjeni North MP Phila Buthelezi. But even these had the support of their fellow legislators.

Delaying

Among the motions passed by the House of Assembly lately that were apparently deemed to be delaying the passage of the budget by senators, was the motion moved by MP Buthelezi for the suspension of payment of last year’s school fees against an instruction from the Executive via the Ministry of Education and Training for parents to pay up; a debate on the legality or constitutionality of the composition of Cabinet moved by Hosea MP Mabuza and; MP Mabuza had also questioned the continued absence on maternity leave of the Minister of Information, Communication and Technology Princess Sikhanyiso after a 14-month absence. MPs had also threatened to withhold the one billion Emalangeni budget for the multi-billion Emalangeni International Convention Centre and Five-Star Hotel (ICC&FISH).

Position

As I see it, the position of senators is that of Parliament rubber stamping the budget without any interrogation or due diligence whatsoever. This, in essence, might be their understanding of a Parliament where there is no opposition. To that end they may not be totally wrong because the construction and configuration of the Tinkhundla political system brooks no opposition. Perhaps it never occurred to the authors of this highly defective and unworkable system that there could emerge from its ranks lawmakers who would defy the status quo and stand for the truth and, by extension, the people. The emergence of youthful MPs who carry the hopes and aspiration, not to speak of the future, of the down trodden majority is indeed shaking the rafters of the political establishment.

The expectation that the elected representatives of the people would, as usual, simply airbrush the budget without any incisive interrogation, in particular of performance reports, was evidently misplaced. In fact Senate has no business interfering with the work of the elected representatives of the people who have real constituencies and in any event wield more clout on money bills.

As it were with the kind of rot in the employment of tax Emalangeni unearthed by the Auditor General Timothy Sipho Matsebula, there is all the reason for MPs to do things differently if only to protect the interests of the taxpayer while ensuring that resources are optimised. Indeed the picture painted by the AG is an extremely ugly one of free runaway spending by government ministries and departments; E498 million irregularly spent on the ICC&FISH; E57 million allocation to a non-existent Ministry of Enterprise and Employment as well as the abolished departments of Income Tax and Customs; Out-of-budget E640 million spent by the Central Transport Administration (CTA), etc.

In all there was over one billion, unauthorized expenditure in the outgoing financial year without any consequences. It is still bewildering that in a country run like a criminal enterprise there is even budgeting because there apparently are no rules of engagement since funds are often diverted to projects not budgeted for and over expenditure has become the norm and there are never any consequences for these transgressions.

Indeed it seems senators ayanhlanhlatseka and if they paid enough attention they would learn more about politics from MPs, especially the youthful lawmakers who have broken from the ranks of Tinkhundla of peddling lies to project a positive image of the system to speaking truth to power. As correctly pointed out by Hosea MP Mabuza, theirs was to drive the people’s mandate and agenda. And if the people wanted to change the Tinkhundla political system they, MPs, would oblige in the same way that the Westminster-styled independence constitution was abrogated through Parliament in 1973.

While senators are expressly appointed to defend and promote the political status quo, the fact can no longer be ignored that the Tinkhundla political system has taken this country to the brink of disaster as amplified by the use of the military as a private militia to protect the economic interests of the political interests.

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