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‘Fringe no-confidence motion should bother Ramaphosa’
By John Eche
Though it has temporarily been shelved till February 2020, analysts say a fringe no-confidence motion moved against South African president, Cyril Ramaphosa should bother the President, whose coming to office had indeed followed a not too dissimilar process.
According to them, the President should not be carried away by the fact that the motion was being introduced by one of the rainbow nation’s smallest opposition parties, the African Transformation Movement (ATM), as there were very clear indications that this was indeed a case of ‘the hand of Esau but the voice of Esau.’
The ATM, which was formed in 2008 and is backed by the Council of Messianic Churches in Christ (SACMCC), presently has only two regional government representatives and the speaker of the South African parliament has said that the decision to postpone further discussions on the motion was in order for parliament to determine whether the vote should be held in a secret, rather than an open ballot.
With conjectures that Ramaphosa’s long-sworn foe, former President Jacob Zuma may be linked to the fringe party, and given Ramaphosa’s poor showing in the arena of COVID-19 control and the management of the South African economy, it is not impossible that many other parliamentarians – including some from the ruling ANC – may take advantage of the situation to launch a mortal blow at Ramaphosa’s continued stay in office.
At the moment, the Ramaphosa camp can count on some support of sorts from the major opposition party, the Democratic Aliance (DA) which has said they will not support the motion. However, parliamentarians from the Economic Freedom Fighters, EFF, which is led by the maverick former leader of the ANC Youth League, Julius Malema cannot be definitely counted in as part of those that will vote for Ramaphosa.
On its part, some fireworks is also expected at the forthcoming ANC National General Council session where over 3,000 delegates would review the ruling party’s performance under Ramaphosa who has himself been fighting to repudiate the allegation of possible wrongdoing from South Africa’s anti-corruption watchdog which avers that he may have misled parliament in relation to a controversial $36,000 (£27,000) he had received in 2017 but which the President insists was nothing but a donation towards his campaign for the ANC leadership back then.
President Cyril Ramaphosa of South Africa
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