He showed you the middle finger. What have you done about it?
I have written to him and asked him to come back on Tuesday or Wednesday.
Why did you write to the deputy president?
I wrote to the deputy president not just about the deputy minister who didn't show up, but also about ensuring that other members of the executive come when they're supposed to, because he is the leader of government business in parliament.
Shouldn't you have summoned him to explain to your committee why he isn't doing his job properly?
That's not necessary yet.
Isn't it his job to ensure that government members don't stand you up?
It is, but this was the first time something like this happened. What we will try and do is make sure that he uses his position to ensure that ministers and deputy ministers turn up.
How will you censure the deputy minister for treating your committee, in effect parliament, with such contempt?
What I'm trying to establish on behalf of the committee is a working arrangement where when we invite ministers to come they do come, and we use the office of the deputy president to make sure that that happens. But we will not be asking for censure yet on the deputy minister. I will have a direct conversation with him about his failure to appear before parliament, and about the importance of showing up in parliament when you've been invited and you've agreed.
Shouldn't you have used this opportunity to make the point up front that you, as parliament's oversight committee, are in charge, not the deputy president, not the executive, not some deputy minister?
I think we have made that point. Firstly, we refused to hold the hearing without the deputy minister there. We chose the date on which either the minister or deputy minister must come to parliament, and they have complied with that date.
When you say you won't censure him, is that because ultimately you're toothless?
No, it's not because I'm toothless. Censure is a laborious process. You have to get the National Assembly to vote on the censure. My view is that we should use the available instruments to compel them to come.
How effective are your available instruments?
They're effective, because he's coming to parliament next week.
Only because the deputy president encouraged him to?
It is possible that the deputy president encouraged him to, I'm not aware of that. What I did was send the minister a letter expressing our disappointment, saying that we expect to see either her or the deputy minister next week. If they'd refused, then we would have escalated the matter to the Speaker's office and the presidency.
Shouldn't you have done something more brutal to nip this kind of thing in the bud, because there's a long history of the executive standing oversight committees up, isn't there?
There is a history. That is why, notwithstanding the fact that there were lots of officials that had come from Pretoria to Cape Town for the hearing, we refused to begin the hearing without the deputy minister.
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