Statement: R2K Campaign Call to Defend Parliament from the Securocrats!
The Right2Know Campaign condemns the use of the military to surround the Parliament, the use of security (allegedly the police) to suppress dissenting voices inside the Parliamentary Chamber, and the jamming of internet and cellphone signals during last night’s State of the Nation Address.
It is clear that these attacks on our democracy have – at the very least – been tolerated by the presiding officers in Parliament. We cannot allow the presiding officers in Parliament to become complicit in the process of undermining our freedom as they did last night.
It appears increasingly that the State can’t or won’t govern by consent and are prepared to govern by increasingly authoritarian means.
It is an undeniable reality that the hands of the securocrats appear to be everywhere. As Business Day has pointed out, just last Sunday, Zuma “told a gathering of editors and journalists that he saw no problem with revelations that the State Security Agency (SSA) was [allegedly] monitoring the movements and communication of journalists in order to identify their sources and report to senior ANC politicians like Mpumalanga Premier David Mabuza”.
Business Day has further reported that “in the weeks leading up to the address, people purportedly acting for, or belonging to the SSA approached some senior journalists with offers of money to spy on the EFF”.
In December 2014, Numsa reported that individuals “suspect[ed] as SSA agents” had attempted to recruit shopstewards in Ekurhuleni and Eastern Cape to spy on the union’s activities and the United Front.
After the cutting of Parliament’s TV feed in August and November 2014, yesterday’s developments add to growing evidence that the flow of information in Parliament is being controlled to restrict dissent and protect the President from having to account for his misuse of millions in public funds.
We demand to know who gave the order for police in civilian clothes to enter the chamber to forcibly remove Economic Freedom Fighters MPs. That action, is not only a breach of the constitution in terms of Section 58 of the Constitution which prohibits arrests, criminal or civil procedure on members of parliament for what they say in parliament, but has the effect of irrevocably undermining parliament as a democratic institution in the eyes of citizens.
We also demand that the Speaker immediately investigates who authorized the installation of the illegal internet/cellphone jamming device, as ICASA has ruled that signal jamming is illegal. We note inconsistent statements from ICASA, however, on whether the security cluster may use signal jamming. As recently as 2012, ICASA stated that it was unlawful for security bodies to signal jam, but stated this morning that security bodies “may, where supported by relevant security legislation, deploy the use of jammers.” Does such security legislation exist? We call on ICASA to clear up this inconsistency.
Too many people sacrificed too much for this democracy. We owe it to them to defend the democratic spaces they opened up in 1994. We call on everyone in South Africa – in particular democrats within the ruling party – to unite and defend Parliament against these attacks.
