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South African parliament to debate Zuma impeachment motion on Tuesday
South Africa's President Jacob Zuma answers questions at Parliament in Cape Town, March 17, 2016. PHOTO BY REUTERS/Mike Hutchings
03/04/2016
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South Africa's parliament will debate on Tuesday a motion to impeach President Jacob Zuma, National Assembly Speaker Baleka Mbete said on Sunday, after a top court ruled the president had violated the constitution.
South Africa's constitutional court ruled on Thursday that Zuma had failed to uphold the constitution by ignoring orders from the public protector that he repay some of the $16 million in state funds spent to renovate his residence at Nkandla.
Since Thursday's ruling, opposition party leaders, ordinary South Africans and even an anti-apartheid activist jailed alongside Nelson Mandela have called on Zuma to step down.
Mmusi Maimane, leader of the opposition party Democratic Alliance, tabled the motion to have Zuma impeached, and Mbete told reporters "the debate on that motion has been scheduled for Tuesday afternoon."
The Africa National Congress majority in parliament will almost certainly give Zuma political cover against the attempt to impeach him. But the judicial rebuke may embolden anti-Zuma factions within the ruling party to mount a challenge.
The unanimous ruling by the 11-judge constitutional court also criticised parliament for passing a resolution that purported to nullify Public Protector Thuli Madonsela's findings on Zuma's private residence.
On Friday, 73-year-old Zuma apologised and said he would pay back some of the money, as ordered. He said that he never knowingly or deliberately set out to violate the constitution.
The scandal is arguably the biggest yet to hit Zuma, who has fended off accusations of corruption, influence peddling and rape since before he took office in 2009.
(Reporting by Olivia Kumwenda-Mtambo; editing by Jason Neely, Larry King)
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