IMPEACHMENT: Phala Phala court arguments put presidential accountability under scrutiny

Parliament’s impeachment process has been forced back to the starting line just as the courts weigh President Cyril Ramaphosa’s challenge to the report at the centre of the Phala Phala saga.

On Friday, MPs were due to make fresh nominations for an evidence leader after the committee rescinded its recommendation of advocate Thandazani Madonsela. Ramaphosa objected that Madonsela “may harbour a sense of grievance towards me”, citing his removal as the president’s representative on the Judicial Service Commission in March 2022 and Madonsela’s legal work for the ANC.

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may harbour a sense of grievance towards me

A parliamentary legal opinion found no actual conflict of interest. It nevertheless treated Madonsela’s earlier disclosure that he had supervised a junior lawyer’s brief to a “parliamentary study group” narrowly. After ANC Secretary-General Fikile Mbalula publicly identified the ANC as the client, the information was considered new and relevant to the committee’s mandate on perceived conflicts. GNU coalition MPs emphasised the issue, while opposition MPs noted that the ANC is the only party in Parliament with study groups. A vote of 18 to nine removed Madonsela and restarted the search.

The committee remains barred from holding public hearings under an interdict Ramaphosa obtained in July, pending the outcome of his review of the Section 89 panel report. The Western Cape Division of the High Court heard three days of arguments before a full Bench on the evidentiary threshold, the process and potential harm to the president’s reputation.

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No president, provided this one succeeds, will ever be subjected to impeachment proceedings.

EFF advocate Mfesane ka-Siboto told the court that “No president, provided this one succeeds, will ever be subjected to impeachment proceedings.” He argued that Ramaphosa had not shown exceptional circumstances for the review while the parliamentary process continued. “If he had been concerned about his reputation, he would not have left the report unchallenged for the past four years,” Ka-Siboto said.

Ramaphosa launched the review after the Constitutional Court in May 2026 set aside the National Assembly’s December 2022 vote, in which the ANC majority rejected the Section 89 report. The Constitutional Court had dismissed Ramaphosa’s direct-access application in early 2023, leaving the matter unresolved until the later ruling.

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If he had been concerned about his reputation, he would not have left the report unchallenged for the past four years.