February 12, 2016•Update: February 17, 2016
By Hassan Isilow and Shuieb Hassen
CAPETOWN, South Africa
Opposition MPs walked out of South Africa’s parliament Thursday night after disrupting President Jacob Zuma’s much-awaited state-of-the-nation address.
“We don’t recognize Zuma as our president. Zupta must fall, Zupta must fall,” chanted red-clad MPs from the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) party.
‘Zupta’ is a new derogatory word used by the EFF to refer to allegations around Zuma’s purported relationship with the wealthy Indian Gupta family of business owners.
The barracking began after parliamentary speaker Baleka Mbete asked the MPs to leave the house after interrupting Zuma’s speech for nearly an hour.
Addressing reporters outside parliament, EFF leader Julius Malema said his 25 MPs would not listen to Zuma’s speech and accused the president of breaching his oath of office.
“We decided to leave the national assembly because we realized Zuma has lost credibility and legitimacy as president of the Republic of South Africa,” Malema said.
Zuma has been accused of not complying with a report from the country’s Public Protector ordering him to pay back millions in public monies used to upgrade his private residence.
On Tuesday, the EFF and the Democratic Alliance brought a case against Zuma in the Constitutional Court. However, the court reserved its judgment in the matter.
In a 2014 report, Public Protector Thuli Madonsela accused Zuma of misusing public money for upgrading his country home in Nkandla Village, KwaZulu Natal Province.
Security work on Zuma’s homestead was supposed to have cost the state around $2.5 million but due to lavish upgrades on the property, such as a swimming pool and an amphitheater, the cost skyrocketed.
Leader of South Africa’s Congress of the People party (COPE) Mosiuoa Lekota also walked out parliament saying he could not listen to the president, accusing him of having failed the people.
- Austerity measures
After the situation calmed down, Zuma continued to deliver his speech in which he promised to cut government expenditure, especially on officials travelling on overseas trips.
“Overseas trips will be curtailed and those requesting permission will have to motivate strongly and prove the benefit to the country," he said to cheers from hundreds of his African National Congress MPs who form a majority in parliament.
He said the sizes of delegations traveling overseas will be greatly reduced and standardized.
“We have made an undertaking to spend public funds wisely and to cut wasteful expenditure," he said.
Zuma added that the finance minister will announce further austerity measures during his budget speech later this month.
South Africa is facing slowing economic growth due to falling commodity prices and electricity constraints which have affected manufacturing industries. The currency has also fallen in value.
The International Monetary Fund and the World Bank predict that the South African economy will grow by less than one percent this year.
Zuma said his country was intending to attract more foreign investors. He said his cabinet has already established an inter-ministerial committee on investment to remove any bottlenecks and ease the investment process.
“Government is developing a one-stop investment shop, an initiative to signal South Africa is truly open for business,” he added.
