Parliament’s standing committee on public accounts (Scopa) plans to meet on Tuesday to discuss correspondence received from suspended ANC member Mervyn Dirks, about remarks allegedly made by president Cyril Ramaphosa on the use of public funds for the governing party’s campaigning.
The comments contained in an audio recording widely distributed on social media were from a meeting of the ANC’s national executive committee (NEC) in December. The head of the presidency, Sibongile Besani, is on record as saying that the audio recording had been taken out of context and distorted what Ramaphosa was trying to say.
Dirks wrote to Scopa chair Mkhuleko Hlengwa in December requesting that Ramaphosa be summoned before the committee to explain. This letter led to him being placed on immediate precautionary suspension by ANC chief whip Pemmy Majodina on Thursday, pending an investigation and a disciplinary hearing for his “unbecoming” behaviour as a whip of the party.
Dirks’s membership of Scopa has also been withdrawn and according to reports has been barred from taking part in ANC activities in parliament during the suspension period. His suspension reportedly came after Majodina asked him to withdraw his letter.
Dirks confirmed his precautionary suspension to Business Day on Friday but said he was not allowed to talk to the media and could not say anything more.
Hlengwa said in a statement that he agreed with Dirks that the matter was serious and would receive Scopa’s attention. Scopa staff had been gathering relevant information on the matter “because without a doubt its seriousness was vivid”, Hlengwa said.
Parliament’s legal services have compiled a legal opinion on the matter and Hlengwa briefed political party representatives from Scopa on the issue earlier this week. A meeting had been planned for Friday to give Dirks an opportunity to state his case, but that had been rescheduled for Tuesday.
“The reported suspension of Mr Dirks has no material bearing on the matter at this point because the committee reserves the right to invite or summons any person to appear before it to provide information, evidence or representation,” Hlengwa said. Even if Dirk were to withdraw his letter, Scopa would still investigate the matter.
“The matter is now a subject of parliamentary process and the committee is seized with it and will take decisions it deems fit, necessary and appropriate,” Hlengwa said.
Any probe by Scopa into the use of state funds for ANC campaigning would come in the wake of the finding by acting chief justice Raymond Zondo in his first report into state capture, in which he noted that “there is alarming evidence” that political parties were being financed through the granting of corrupt tenders. He found “at least two instances” of the proceeds of corruption from high-value contracts being diverted to the ANC.
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