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Only a court can 'unsuspend' Ramaphosa: Ace
15 Jun 2021 at 06:14hrs | Views
Suspended ANC secretary-general Ace Magashule insists that ANC president Cyril Ramaphosa remains "suspended" until a court of law decides otherwise.
This was the salvo fired by a defiant Magashule in his responding affidavit filed at the High Court in Johannesburg.
Magashule argues in the affidavit that the party's highest decision-making body between conferences, the national executive committee (NEC), had no legal standing to declare his letter to Ramaphosa suspending him "unlawful and invalid". Even if it did, charged Magashule, the manner in which Ramaphosa's suspension was dismissed by the NEC was not in line with laws of "natural justice".
Magashule is protesting that Ramaphosa was allowed to be present in the meeting that discussed his suspension.
What makes matters worse, he went on, is that Ramaphosa was the same person to communicate the verdict in the case about him.
It was for these reasons that Magashule held that Ramaphosa should remain suspended until he took his suspension on review in a court of law. If the court allowed the NEC dismissal of his letter suspending Ramaphosa, only anarchy would prevail.
"Suffice to say one cannot imagine a bigger affront or violation of the rule of law than the anarchy which might follow if any person was allowed to resort to self-help by simply ignoring actions taken in terms of empowering provisions of statutory law or the common law, by simply ignoring those actions without taking any steps to declare them unlawful by using the correct and available legal processes," argued Magashule.
"This is exactly what (Ramaphosa) and (the ANC) did in respect to the suspension of Mr Ramaphosa. No court can conceivably endorse this kind of conduct."
This was the salvo fired by a defiant Magashule in his responding affidavit filed at the High Court in Johannesburg.
Magashule argues in the affidavit that the party's highest decision-making body between conferences, the national executive committee (NEC), had no legal standing to declare his letter to Ramaphosa suspending him "unlawful and invalid". Even if it did, charged Magashule, the manner in which Ramaphosa's suspension was dismissed by the NEC was not in line with laws of "natural justice".
Magashule is protesting that Ramaphosa was allowed to be present in the meeting that discussed his suspension.
It was for these reasons that Magashule held that Ramaphosa should remain suspended until he took his suspension on review in a court of law. If the court allowed the NEC dismissal of his letter suspending Ramaphosa, only anarchy would prevail.
"Suffice to say one cannot imagine a bigger affront or violation of the rule of law than the anarchy which might follow if any person was allowed to resort to self-help by simply ignoring actions taken in terms of empowering provisions of statutory law or the common law, by simply ignoring those actions without taking any steps to declare them unlawful by using the correct and available legal processes," argued Magashule.
"This is exactly what (Ramaphosa) and (the ANC) did in respect to the suspension of Mr Ramaphosa. No court can conceivably endorse this kind of conduct."
Source - Sowetan
