PRESIDENT Cyril Ramaphosa is scared that the Phala Phala scandal enquiry will humiliate him.
Through his lawyer, Advocate Wim Trengove SC, he told the Western Cape High Court, on Wednesday, 15 July, that the interdict he is seeking is meant to protect him.
Ramaphosa dismissed allegations that his interdict application is an attempt to evade accountability and labelled them as “baseless and politically motivated”.
“Fact of the public inquiry is already humiliating to the president, a humiliation against which the Act protects him,” said Trengove.
Ramaphosa approached the court seeking an order to block Parliament’s impeachment proceedings.
He contends the material underpinning the process is “unlawful”.
Opposing him, Advocate William Mokhare SC, representing RISE Mzansi MP and impeachment committee chairman Makashule Gana, argued that the Ramaphosa’s attempt to halt the inquiry risks undermining the constitutional framework.
He said it would allow a sitting president to challenge and delay individual steps rather than letting Parliament carry out its full oversight function.
Mokhare sought to reassure Ramaphosa that the process would be fair.
He submitted: “The humiliation that the president is saying he apprehends will be taken care of by the chairman, ensuring that nobody abuses the committee to advance personal or even inflict defamatory unfounded statements, including the president.”
Ramaphosa has asked the court to stop Parliament’s impeachment committee from starting its inquiry into the theft of US dollars from his Phala Phala farm in Limpopo.
This, pending his separate application to review the independent panel report that found he had a case to answer.
At least $580 000 in cash was stolen from the farm near Bela-Bela in February 2020.
At the time, Ramaphosa said the money came from the sale of buffaloes to a Sudanese businessman.
The matter is before a full bench comprising Judges André le Grange, Matthew Francis, and Diane Davis.
Advocate Anton Katz SC, for the African Transformation Movement, reminded the court of the Constitutional Court’s 2016 Nkandla judgment, in which then Chief Justice Mogoeng Mogoeng warned courts against entertaining matters that fell outside the parameters of judicial authority.
Katz said the president was asking the court to cross into the lane of another branch of government and to prescribe to the National Assembly how to hold the executive accountable.
“This application asks for extraordinary relief,” he said.
