President should be impeached

IN TERMS of section 96 (2) of the Constitution President Cyril Ramaphosa is guilty on two counts.

One, by his own admission, he is engaged in a paid occupation through his farming business.

Two, he has exposed himself to a “situation involving the risk of a conflict between their official responsibilities and private interests”.

That is not even addressing the elephant in the room that is the involvement of the SAPS and State Security Agency in a form of cover-up.

That is having not exhausted the questions, who were the buyers of the ankole cattle and why were they still at his farm, two years later.

That is at the present moment overlooking the allegation of murder, that of kidnapping and that of the significant use of state resources in the Machiavellian cover-up.

The discussion of integrity and honour has escaped. We are too far gone. What exists today is the discussion of law and constitutionality, or the lack thereof.

In the interest of the Republic, his family and himself as an individual who must exist beyond this scandal, the president should surrender his seat at Pretoria’s Union Buildings.

No form of political propaganda can blot out this nightmare.

In another country, Ramaphosa’s admission would have caused parliament, the assembly that elected him, to speedily begin impeachment processes. The electorate would recognise the error it made at the polls and seek to correct it by calling for his immediate resignation.

The Financial Intelligence Centre, revenue service, and Reserve Bank would call for a full disclosure and investigation facilitated by independent bodies and the judiciary. In another country.

In a real constitutional democracy.