The EFF says it will turn to the Constitutional Court after the Western Cape High Court dismissed their application to declare that MPs were violently removed from two State of the Nation Address (Sona) sittings.
The EFF had turned to the court arguing that their rights to freedom of speech were infringed and their members’ violent removal was “was both unlawful and unconstitutional”.
Both Sona proceedings experienced prolonged delays due to EFF members raising numerous points of order and halting proceedings until they were physically removed from both sittings.
Judge Derek Wille said the EFF “allegedly wilfully, violently and with premeditation unlawfully disrupted certain presidential proceedings”.
In a statement, the EFF said “brutality against elected public representatives who uphold their oath of office sends a crude message to its citizens”.
“It is such acts of violence and constitutional disregard that significantly contributed to the ANC losing their majority in Parliament. With the ANC now at 40%, we can expect increased accountability...
“The EFF aims to appeal the ruling at the Constitutional Court, as we continue to participate dynamically and determinedly to strengthen our democracy,” the EFF said.
Judge Wille found that on both occasions, the proceedings were disrupted for inordinately long periods and the members refused to obey the instructions to desist from their disruptive behaviour.
“Ultimately, the members disrupting the proceedings were instructed to withdraw and refused. After their refusal to withdraw caused further significant disruptions, the personnel responsible for security were instructed to escort out those members who were disrupting proceedings and who refused to leave.
“According to the respondents (Speaker of the National Assembly, chairperson of the National Council of Provinces (NCOP) and Minister of Police), EFF’s parliamentary members refused to cooperate, and they allegedly physically resisted their ejectment and assaulted the personnel instructed to implement their ejectment.
“The first and second respondents’ case is that they did not instruct that any members be assaulted or harmed in any way when they were being removed and took every reasonable measure to ensure that, when as a last resort, members were ejected by the parliamentary personnel to restore order, they would not be physically harmed,” the judgment read.
In their arguments, the Speaker of the National Assembly and chairperson of the NCOP contended that the EFF, like all other parliamentary members, have freedom of speech during the parliamentary process when at the podium but that these disruptions were “undemocratic” adding that it “constituted grossly disorderly conduct”.
Judge Wille said: “EFF made it publicly known that they intended to cause disruptions to these parliamentary proceedings (Sona 2015). Given the planned disruption of proceedings and that parliamentary staff did not have the requisite training, capacity, or skillset to remove members, the first and second respondents decided to second members of the third respondent who were specifically trained in crowd control to eject a member who refused to leave when ordered to do so...”
Cape Times