President Cyril Ramaphosa has drawn parallels to the case in which late former public enterprises minister Pravin Gordhan was said to have been maligned as “untruthful and a spy” as he fights to stop Parliament from hauling him before a public impeachment inquiry over Phala Phala.
In heads of argument filed in the Western Cape High Court on Friday, Ramaphosa’s legal team argues that the impeachment process should be halted pending the outcome of his review of the independent panel report that found he had a case to answer over the burglary at his Limpopo game farm.
The president wants the court to interdict the National Assembly’s impeachment committee from proceeding until his review is heard from September 2 to 4.
His lawyers say the application is “far more modest” than his opponents suggest.
“The president, in other words, merely asks for a stay of a few months,” they argue.
His lawyers argue that the National Assembly rules were designed to protect an incumbent president from the “ignominy of a public impeachment hearing on baseless charges”.
They argue that allowing Parliament to proceed before testing the lawfulness of the panel report would destroy that protection.
Ramaphosa’s team leans heavily on the Constitutional Court’s decision in EFF v Gordhan, where the court accepted that Gordhan could suffer irreparable harm if remedial action against him was not suspended pending review.
The heads quote the finding that the SARS report “maligned him as being untruthful and a spy”.
They add that the remedial action in that matter could affect Gordhan’s “political career and his personal circumstances”.
“These fears are not misplaced,” the quoted passage reads.
Ramaphosa now places himself in that same category of political harm.
The president’s lawyers argue that the stay is necessary to uphold the rule of law and prevent an impeachment hearing based on an invalid report.
The heads also attack the independent panel’s central finding, saying it applied the wrong threshold when it found that Ramaphosa had a prima facie case to answer.
According to Ramaphosa, the rules required the panel to determine whether “sufficient evidence exists” to warrant the “momentous act” of a public impeachment inquiry.
His lawyers argue that the panel “mistakenly lowered the bar”.
They also argue that the panel overlooked a crucial requirement: bad faith.
Under the National Assembly rules, they say, impeachable conduct must involve intentional, malicious or bad-faith conduct.
“The panel, however, overlooked this requirement,” the heads state.
On the Phala Phala business, Ramaphosa says he did not perform “paid work” through Ntaba Nyoni, the entity linked to the farm. His lawyers say that he was not paid, that the entity had not made a profit, and that his role was akin to that of a shareholder.
On the failure to report a crime complaint, they say the panel itself recorded that Ramaphosa reported the theft to Gen Wally Rhoode and expected him to process it according to police procedures.
That, they argue, points to good faith, not bad faith.
- President Ramaphosa seeks to halt Parliament's impeachment inquiry into the Phala Phala farm burglary until his legal review of the panel report is completed in early September.
- His legal team cites the Constitutional Court's EFF v Gordhan precedent, arguing he faces political harm similar to Gordhan, who was maligned and harmed by premature remedial action.
- Ramaphosa's lawyers claim the independent panel applied the wrong legal threshold and overlooked the requirement of bad faith for impeachable conduct.
- They argue Ramaphosa did not personally profit from the Phala Phala business and reported the theft in good faith through proper channels.
- The legal team contends that proceeding with impeachment before reviewing the panel report would violate the rule of law and undermine protections against baseless public hearings.
