Three opposition parties are to hold a meeting at Parliament this afternoon to protest against being excluded from the parliamentary programme on Monday to celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Constitution.
President Thabo Mbeki is to address a joint sitting of Parliament at 2.15pm on Monday.
In a statement issued by the Democratic Alliance, spokesperson Martin Slabbert said that his party’s leader, Tony Leon, the Inkatha Freedom Party leader Mangosuthu Buthelezi and the Freedom Front Plus leader Dr Pieter Mulder would address a meeting of their members of Parliament and members of the media to express “their disapproval of the decision by the Speaker of the National Assembly [Baleka Mbete] and chairperson of the National Council of Provinces [Johannes Mahlangu] to change the programme without consultation and to exclude all the other parties in Parliament from participating in today’s [Monday] 10-year celebration of the Constitution at Parliament”.
Slabbert said it was the combined view that the Constitution “belongs to all of the people of South Africa who are represented in Parliament by all of the parties”.
“It is therefore wrong to use them all merely as an audience instead of allowing all parties the opportunity of responding to the president as was originally agreed and being able to pledge their support for and allegiance to the Constitution.”
Meanwhile Buthelezi said in a statement: “It is relevant to note that today [Monday] is not, in fact, the 10th nnniversary of the adoption of the Constitution. The Inkatha Freedom Party, and other political parties, asked the constitutional court to review some of the provisions of the draft Constitution, included the powers of provinces. The Constitution was only certified in October 1996.
“I believe a Constitution is as only strong as its weakest link. A decade on it is clear that many of the IFP’s concerns about inherent weaknesses in the Constitution have come to pass. Of particular concern to me is the relentless concentration of power at the centre. The lack of institutional autonomy is giving rise to autocracy. Power in South Africa is inexorably drifting towards a narrow political and economic oligarchy, whilst the plight of the poor ever worsens.
“We must therefore not lose focus that we are celebrating today is, for many, merely political intent. We still need to bring about economic freedom that will transform our country into a truly free society based upon human dignity in which none of our people are afflicted by HIV/Aids, poverty, crime or despair.” – I-Net Bridge