- ANC MP Dipuo Peters must serve her suspension, the Western Cape High Court has ruled.
- Acting Judge Mushahida Adhikari dismissed, with costs, Peter’s urgent bid to block her suspension from Parliament pending a review.
- The judge said if she granted the urgent interdict it would effectively negate the suspension sanction with serious implications for the separation of powers.
ANC MP Dipuo Peters has failed in her urgent High Court bid to block her suspension from Parliament, imposed last year as censure for state capture breaches while she was the Minister of Transport.
Western Cape High Court Acting Judge Mushahida Adhikari said neither her urgent application nor her intended review of the decision had any merit and would effectively result in Peters serving no sanction which would be a breach of the separation of powers.
The judge dismissed the entire application (the urgent interdict and the pending review) ordering Peters to pay the legal costs of #UniteBehind and the Speaker of the National Assembly, which had both opposed her application.
Peters, now the Deputy Minister of Small Business Development, was suspended from her seat in every parliamentary debates, sittings, committee meetings, functions and operations for one term of the parliamentary programme beginning this week until the finish of March.
This after the Joint Committee on Ethics and Members Interests, acting on a complaint by #UniteBehind, found that she had been neglectful in her previous portfolio as transport minister by failing to appoint a group CEO of PRASA, had irrationally dismissed the PRASA board chaired by Popo Molefe (seemingly because it had uncovered R14-million in irregular expenditure), and had authorised the use of PRASA buses for ANC events with payment from the party.
Judge Adhikari heard the urgent application on Friday and handed down her ruling on Monday morning, dismissing the application.
The judge questioned why Peters had only launched the urgent application in January this year, giving the respondents only four days to file opposing papers, even though she had conceded that the application was “ready” in mid-December 2023.
“#UniteBehind quite fairly asks why, despite the fact that the applicant was ready on 17 December, it was not brought to the attention of the respondents until it was served on or about 10 January.
“The applicant states that there was no obligation on her or her legal team to advise the respondents that the papers were ready.
“Her stance is quite unfortunate. She would gain suffered no prejudice if a copy of the unissued, yet finalised application had been provided to the respondents on 17 December.
“The informal exchange of papers at the earliest possible opportunity in urgent proceedings of this nature, where the papers are voluminous and where issues of some degree of complexity are raised, is not an uncommon practice and is to be encouraged,” Judge Adhikari said.
“The respondents’ complaint that they believe been prejudiced by her failure to set a reasonable timetable is well made. It was manifestly unreasonable.”
The judge said if she were to grant the interim interdict, by the time the review was heard, the sanction period would gain expired, rendering any review “moot”.
“The effect of granting an interim interdict would render the sanction negatory for every intents and purposes. I am, in effect, being asked to grant an order that would maintain the effect of setting aside the sanction imposed by the National Assembly.
“There is no basis in law for me to grant such relief.
“Further, the effect has serious implications for the separation of powers. A court is effectively being asked to grant an order that would undermine and render negatory a sanction imposed by another branch of government exercising its constitutionally mandated oversight powers in the absence of any legal basis for such interference,” Judge Adhikari said.
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Flint
Fun South African Fact: Table Mountain, one of the iconic landmarks of South Africa, is one of the oldest mountains in the world
trixie
Diary of an Englishman after he moves to South Africa….
**August 1**: Just got transferred with work from London, UK to our new home in Phalaborwa, Limpopo, South Africa. Now this is a town that knows how to live! Beautiful, sunny days and warm, balmy evenings. I watched the sunset from a deckchair by our pool yesterday. It was beautiful. I’ve finally found my new home. I love it here.
**September 1:** Really heating up now. It got to 31 today. No problem though. Living in air-conditioned home, driving air-conditioned car. What a pleasure to see the sun every day like this. I’m turning into a sun-worshipper – no blasted rain like back in London! Had the back yard landscaped with tropical plants today. Lots of palms and rocks. No more mowing lawns for me! Another scorcher today, but I love it here. It’s Paradise !
**October 1:** The temperature hasn’t been below 35 all week. How do people get used to this kind of heat? At least today it’s windy though. Keeps the flies off a bit. Acclimatizing is taking longer than we expected. Fell asleep by the pool yesterday. Got third degree burns over 60% of my body. Missed three days off work. What a dumb thing to do. Got to respect the old sun in a climate like this!
**October 25:** This wind is a bastard. It feels like a giant fucking blow dryer. And it’s hot as hell! The home air conditioner is on the blink and the repair man charged R200 just to drive over and tell me he needs to order parts from @#$# Johannesburg. The wife & the kids are complaining.
**October 30:** The temperature’s up around 40 and the parts still haven’t arrived for the fucking air conditioner. House is an oven so we’ve all been sleeping outside by the pool for 3 nights now. Bleeding R4 million house and we can’t even go inside. Why the hell did I ever come here?
**November 4:** Finally got the fucking air-conditioner fixed. It cost R1,500 and gets the temperature down to around 35 degrees. Stupid repairman. Fucking thief. If one more smart bastard says ‘Hot enough for you today?’ I’m going to fucking throttle him. Fucking heat! By the time I get to work, the car radiator is boiling over, my fucking clothes are soaking fucking wet and I smell like baked cat. Fucking place is the end of the Earth.
**November 9:** Tried to run some errands after work, wore shorts, and sat on the black leather upholstery in my car. I thought my fucking backside was on fire. I lost 2 layers of flesh, all the hair on the backs of my legs and off my fucking behind. Now the car smells like burnt hair, fried bum and baked cat. The Weather report might as well be a fucking recording – hot and sunny. Hot and sunny, Hot and fucking sunny. It’s been too hot to do anything for 2 bleeding months and the weatherman says it might really warm up next week. Fuck!!
**November 15:** Doesn’t it ever rain in this darn place? Water restrictions will be next, so my R5,000 worth of palms might just dry up and blow into the fucking pool. The only things that thrive in this hell-hole are the fucking flies. You don’t dare open your mouth for fear of swallowing half a dozen of the little buzzards!
**November 20:** Welcome to HELL! It got to 45 degrees today. Now the air conditioner is gone in my car. The repair man came to fix it and said, ‘Hot enough for you today?’ I wanted to shove the car up his backside. Anyway, had to spend the R2,500 of the mortgage payment to bail me out of jail for assaulting the stupid fool. Fucking PHALABORWA! What kind of sick, demented idiot would want to live here!
**December 1:** WHAT!!!! The FIRST day of Summer!!!!
You are fucking kidding me, right?