A heated tug-of-war inside Parliament has moved South Africa’s long-running Ramaphosa impeachment drama into a new phase, with the National Assembly’s sub-committee on review rules adopting draft legislation that will govern how any future presidential impeachment motion is processed. The breakthrough came after days of bruising exchanges between the ANC, the Democratic Alliance, the MK Party and smaller caucus members, all fighting over who gets to sit on a panel that could ultimately decide the political fate of the President.
At the centre of the storm is a proposed Section 89 committee of the Constitution, which would be assembled to assess whether the President has committed a “serious violation of the Constitution or the law”, serious misconduct, or is unable to perform the functions of office. MPs agreed that only members deemed “fit and proper” should serve on such a committee — a clause championed by the DA and accepted, in principle, by the ANC’s majority.
The DA’s chief whip, Siviwe Gwarube, argued that nominees must be beyond reproach, given the gravity of removing a sitting head of state. Her ANC counterpart, Penny Moloi, initially raised eyebrows when she suggested a sitting MP could be considered “fit and proper” even if facing criminal charges — provided those charges had not yet resulted in a conviction. The remark sparked a furious reaction from opposition benches, and was later walked back in subsequent sittings.
The MK Party, led by former president Jacob Zuma’s political vehicle, used the proceedings to push for wider reforms, including a dedicated office of parliamentary legal counsel. The party’s chief whip, Ponshotlo Ledwaba, accused the ANC of trying to rig the process in Cyril Ramaphosa’s favour and demanded that any new rules apply retroactively to motions already before the House — including those tied to the Phala Phala affair.
That demand has alarmed civil society groups, who fear Parliament is engineering rules to shield the President from scrutiny. According to Weekend World, insiders close to the sub-committee believe a deliberate effort is being made to narrow the scope of admissible evidence and to limit the time within which an impeachment motion can be revived after being withdrawn. Campaigners warn this could effectively kill off the Phala Phala inquiry before it reaches the substantive stage.
Ramaphosa impeachment rules: where the parties stand
The political fault lines inside the sub-committee are now laid bare. Below is a breakdown of each major party’s position on the proposed rules and their stance on the President’s removal.
| Party | Lead Negotiator | Position on “Fit and Proper” Test | Stance on Impeachment |
|---|---|---|---|
| ANC | Penny Moloi | Initially broad, later narrowed after backlash | Wants rules to apply prospectively only |
| DA | Siviwe Gwarube | Must exclude MPs facing criminal charges | Supports a robust, independent committee |
| MK Party | Ponshotlo Ledwaba | Demands fully independent oversight | Wants rules to apply retroactively to Phala Phala |
| EFF | Vuyiviwe Malinga | Backs strict eligibility criteria | Will oppose any rule that protects the President |
| Good Party | Brett Herron | Supports transparency reforms | Open to broader reform of Section 89 |
What the table makes clear is that while the ANC and DA have, on the face of it, agreed on the fit and proper principle, the underlying battle is over how that principle is defined in law. The ANC wants flexibility; the opposition wants teeth. Until those definitions are locked into the final rules, the compromise is fragile.
A key procedural win for the ruling party came when the sub-committee voted to adopt the draft rules, clearing the way for the full National Assembly to debate and formalise them as soon as next week. National Assembly Speaker Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula is expected to schedule the debate once legal services finish certifying the revised text. Should the rules pass, any future motion to impeach Ramaphosa — or any other President — would be filtered through a more clearly defined and legally airtight process.
Supporters of the new framework say it finally gives Parliament the constitutional clarity it has lacked since 1994. South Africa has never actually impeached a president, and the absence of standing rules has meant that any motion of this kind risked collapsing under its own legal weight. Critics, however, argue the rules are being drafted in a manner that insulates the incumbent from accountability, particularly given the unresolved Phala Phala scandal involving alleged millions of dollars in cash stashed on his Limpopo game farm.
It is the Phala Phala matter that hangs over everything. The Section 89 inquiry, if properly constituted, could compel the President to account publicly for the transactions, the role of his security detail, and the conduct of the now-withdrawn criminal investigation. A watered-down set of rules — or rules that prevent the motion from being revived — would be a quiet but devastating blow to the campaign for transparency.
The next seven days will be telling. Should MPs adopt the new rules without significant amendment, opposition parties have signalled they may turn to the courts to challenge any provision that retrospectively shields the President from impeachment proceedings. Legal experts, including several constitutional law professors at the University of the Western Cape and Wits, have already offered opinions suggesting that certain clauses could be vulnerable to a constitutional challenge.
For now, the President remains in office, and the sub-committee’s draft rules await their final test in the National Assembly chamber. But the political temperature inside Parliament shows no sign of cooling, and the question of whether Cyril Ramaphosa will ever face a full impeachment hearing now rests on a handful of clauses, a handful of votes, and a principle as old as the Constitution itself: that no one, not even the President, is above the law.