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SPEAKER MUST SHAPE UP OR SHIP OUT - SOME MPS

04/10/2021 08:35:00 BY STANLEY KHUMALO

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MANZINI – Some Members of Parliament (MPs) seem to rally behind their colleague and want the Speaker of the august House to shape up or face a vote of no confidence, as they claim he is sabotaging their work.

The Speaker in the House of Assembly is Mhlambanyatsi Constituency MP Petros Mavimbela. According to some legislators, the Speaker is not listing some of their motions in the Order Paper despite having submitted them to his office. The MPs were contacted following our sister publication, the Times SUNDAY, interview with veteran politician in Lobamba Lomdzala Constituency MP Marwick Khumalo, who said Mavimbela no longer conducted himself as Speaker, but behaved like a member of the Executive. This position of thinking was taken by Khumalo after the Speaker prevented the moving of two motions of ‘national importance’ in the House last Thursday.

Motions

One of the motions was to be moved by Khumalo and it was intended to call for the House to debate the petitions that were delivered to almost all constituencies in June 2021. Also, Khumalo’s motion sought the House to debate the issue of the people who were killed during the unrest; with individuals and organisations claiming that over 70 people were killed, allegedly by security forces, while government’s official death toll was at 37. The other motion, which was reportedly supposed to be moved by Madlangempisi MP Sibusiso ‘Scorpion’ Nxumalo and seconded by Ndzingeni MP Lutfo Dlamini, was intended to have the House debate the issue of a national dialogue on the political challenges faced by the country. However, Mavimbela did not allow Khumalo to move the motion because he claimed not to have seen or received it in order to apply himself to it. MP Nxumalo could also not move his motion as the Speaker is said to have also played the same card as he did with MP Khumalo.

Analysis

In light of this, the legislators were asked if according to their own analysis, was the Speaker still engaging in his duties as guided by the rules of the House and if they still had confidence in him. Mkhiweni Constituency MP Michael Masuku said legislators found themselves engaging in political issues outside the House because motions were not included in the Order Paper. This, he said, was against the spirit of the House. Masuku said this was because they wanted the motions to be debated in order to improve service delivery, while enforcing accountability from the Executive. Timphisini Constituency MP Nelson Mamba said what transpired in Parliament on Thursday was quite a challenge as the issue of petitions had been on the agenda of MPs for quite some time. He said what had been prolonging engaging on them (petitions), was that there had been no House sittings, as the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) was having its sittings. “This needs us to deal with it immediately as the unrest is stemming from these issues. The numbers witnessed during the petition delivery on Friday are testimony that the public means business,” Mamba said.

Urgent

The MP said the petitions needed the urgent action of Parliament so that the issues were addressed before things became worse than they already were. In fact, Mamba said by now, all structures should have addressed the concerns submitted to constituency centres as they were of national importance. He said all along, the Speaker was working well with them until recently, when on Thursday, they did not understand why the motion was not in the Order Paper. “He should have dealt with this as there is nothing to defend.” Mamba said if there would be a vote of no confidence, he knew exactly how his vote would be casted. Also, Lomahasha Constituency MP Ndumiso Masimula said he was not happy with the recent developments by the Speaker.

Masimula said Parliament was where political issues should be discussed and it was disheartening to them when motions were not set out in the Order Paper. “The motions are means to address whatever challenges we see in government and they help us engage in our oversight role; so if they are not in the order of business, how do we address the issues?” he asked rhetorically. The legislator reiterated that he was not happy with the Speaker as he was failing to see to it that motions were registered in the Order Paper. He said legislators should look beyond this as it could be a systemic challenge. Also, Matsanjeni South Constituency MP Bomber Mamba said the responsibility of the Speaker was to receive motions and allocate them in the Order Paper and those that were not in it, should have explanation on why they were not listed so that improvements could be made on them.

The legislator said it was a challenge when a motion was moved by an MP and supported by evidence that it was received but not filed in the Order Paper. “The motions are our responsibility and if they are not in the Order Paper, it means we are not working and the electorate gets aggrieved,” he noted. At this point, Matsanjeni South Constituency MP Bomber Mamba said: “Things are not well in the House and that is not right as there is some form of resistance with some motions.”

Establish

For now, the legislator said he needed to establish other motions that were moved and not filed in the Order Paper in order to be certain if the Speaker deserved a vote of no confidence. Meanwhile, an effort to get a comment from the Speaker proved futile. When he was contacted on his mobile phone, Mavimbela repeatedly said ‘hello’ and seemed to listened for introduction by the reporter. Thereafter, the call was terminated and efforts to get hold of him again proved futile as it rang unanswered. A short message was sent to him, which sought to establish if there were motions that he was afraid to have discussed in Parliament and give feedback on why some motions were not in the Order Paper. Mavimbela was also asked if the petitions that were delivered to constituency centres would ever be discussed in Parliament and if he was still fit to hold the office of Speaker as some MPs were saying the opposite.