MPs should not be allowed to picket inside the National Assembly, holding up placards during sittings in the House and there should maybe be a rule adopted to prevent this in future.
So says rules sub-committee chairperson Richard Mdakane, who was speaking during the committee’s sitting today, where State Law Advisors were making submission on the Rules of the National Assembly.
This after Economic Freedom Fighters MP staged a silent protest during President Jacob Zuma’s Budget Vote Debate in Parliament this week, waving placards calling for the release of the Marikana Report.
In the committee meeting of the rules sub-committee attended by only three ANC MPs, and State Law Advisors, Mdakane said if placards are allowed, it was going to happen every time.
“In the last sitting, the EFF had placards in the chamber. If any member of the Parliament comes in there with placards demonstrating right in the chamber, what is the speaker to do. I would have thought the speaker would have called them to order. Members of Parliament are not allowed to picket inside.
“Of course, we allowed them. Generally every time we spoke they just made noise with the papers. If it happened once it is going to happen everytime, if people come to the chamber and are not happy, they come with placards; I think it will be a problem.”
Mdakane said a distinction had to be drawn between creating order and allowing democracy to thrive.
“We must also strike a balance that we don’t go to order and control at the expense of democracy. But also we don’t go to democracy, at the expense of order and control. We must strike this balance. A member of Parliament should not make it difficult for us to protest if he is protesting. Must not undermine our own rights as MPs to be heard, but at the same time the MP who wants to raise a point must also be protected. The balance is important.”
Mdakane said it was important, though, that all parties be part of the rules review process, as members tended to respect something they were part and parcel of creating. The committee also discussed the issue of members not leaving the House when ordered to do so by Speaker Baleka Mbete, and how that undermined her authority.
“If the Speaker cannot be listened to, then the House should be collapsed, completely. Once members come with placards, they will come with any other thing into the chamber and completely undermine the decorum of the house. And then what do we do? Should those members who then don’t have placards also have placards that say “away with placards”? Without order there is no democracy and without democracy, there is no order.”
The rights of the individuals against the rights of collective was also in the spotlight, with ANC MP Julie Killian suggesting the possibility of a threshold on votes of no confidence, as having them tabled constantly cheapened them.
The State Law advisors also suggested that the rules committee look into defining what a point of privilege was and a point of order, as the rules were not clear on it.