The ANC will now turn to the Constitutional Court in an attempt not to hand over all records of its cadre deployment committee to the DA.
Earlier this month, the Supreme Court of Appeal dismissed the ANC’s application to appeal against an earlier court decision that all records of its cadre deployment committee must be handed over to the DA.
The Court of Appeal found that the ANC’s application for leave to appeal had “no reasonable prospects of success” and that there were “no other compelling reasons why an appeal should be heard”. The ANC’s application was dismissed with costs.
This meant that within days the ANC had to hand over the complete records and minutes of its cadre deployment committee, dating from 1 January 2013 when Pres. Cyril Ramaphosa became chairman of this committee, handed over to the DA.
According to dr. However, Leon Schreiber, DA MP and the party’s spokesperson on public administration and the public service, said the ANC “has fallen into full-scale panic as it tries to delay the inevitable release of its cadre deployment secrets”.
The DA received a letter from the ANC’s lawyers on Friday in which they confirm that they will now approach the Constitutional Court to try to stop the release of the records.
“Like all the ANC’s previous attempts, this final court application is doomed to fail. There are simply no legal grounds for the ANC to keep its cadre deployment records secret, because the whole reason cadre deployment exists is to enable the ANC to interfere with appointments to public sector posts,” says Schreiber.
“Cadre deployment therefore has a direct impact on the public, through load shedding and the widespread collapse of service delivery, which means that the public has a constitutional and inherent right to be informed of the contents of all cadre deployment records.”
The DA is confident that the Constitutional Court will also rule in its favour.
“Once the court has done this, the ANC will no longer be able to hide anywhere and will be forced to immediately hand over all cadre deployment documents to the DA. Should it come to that, the DA will also insist on imprisonment and contempt of court against any ANC leader who tries to delay this process after the Constitutional Court rejected this last appeal attempt.”
It was earlier ordered that the ANC must hand over all meeting minutes, WhatsApp conversations, e-mails, CVs and other relevant documents to the DA.
“For more than two decades, a small group of senior ANC figures regularly met in smoke-filled back rooms at Luthuli House to corrupt appointment processes by ensuring that only ‘loyal cadres’ of the ANC were appointed to positions of power in the public sector. As a result, skilled and deserving applicants are sidelined, with positions held out on the basis of loyalty to the ANC.”
According to Schreiber, the DA is also currently awaiting a verdict in a second court application, where he asked the Pretoria High Court to declare ANC cadre deployment unconstitutional and illegal.
“The combined effect of these two court cases will be to pierce the veil of secrecy that surrounds cadre deployment and to tear down the foundations on which it is built.”
