{"id":11069,"date":"2020-03-10T13:48:18","date_gmt":"2020-03-10T13:48:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/amabhungane.org\/?post_type=advocacy&p=11069"},"modified":"2020-03-10T13:48:18","modified_gmt":"2020-03-10T13:48:18","slug":"advocacy-release-cr17-court-kicks-transparency-question-into-touch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/advocacy-release-cr17-court-kicks-transparency-question-into-touch\/","title":{"rendered":"Advocacy release: CR17 \u2013 court kicks transparency question into touch"},"content":{"rendered":"

AmaBhungane notes today\u2019s ruling<\/a> in the CR17 matter, in which a high court bench threw out the public protector\u2019s controversial investigation and findings on Cyril Ramaphosa\u2019s internal campaign to become president of the ANC.<\/p>\n

AmaB entered the case as an independent party<\/a>, not to take sides with either side, but to ask the court to ensure its findings on the dispute would uphold transparency and the media\u2019s right to inform the public.<\/p>\n

We argued that, if the court found that the Executive Ethics Code did not require Ramaphosa \u2013 or any other member of the executive \u2013 to disclose the funding of internal leadership campaigns, the court should declare the code to be unconstitutional.<\/p>\n

This would ensure that the code could be amended, paving the way for a more transparent system going forward.<\/p>\n

The court did not accede to our plea, on technical grounds.<\/p>\n

In its ruling, it said: \u201cThere is no doubt that amaBhungane’s case is founded on issues that are critical to our democracy and the constitutional project.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is unthinkable that anyone concerned with the proper functioning of our constitutional democracy would disagree with the broad principles outlined in their submissions. We certainly do not.\u201c<\/p>\n

The court also stressed that this did not mean the Executive Ethics Code was constitutional \u2013 simply that it was an argument for another day.<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s ruling turns the spotlight back on Parliament, which has yet to amend the ethics code for MPs to ensure internal campaign funding is publicly disclosed \u2013 despite findings in a similar case involving former DA leader Mmusi Maimane in 2017.<\/p>\n

AmaBhungane has been engaging with Parliament regarding the Maimane matter and will use that as another front to achieve the same purpose of making internal campaign financing transparent.<\/p>\n

AmaBhungane makes interventions like these as part of our advocacy mandate to help secure the information rights that are the lifeblood of investigative journalism. A more transparent system is vital to ensuring that journalists can better inform the public on the influence of money in politics.<\/p>\n

AmaB will study today\u2019s judgment with our legal team before taking any decision on next steps, including the possibility of an appeal.<\/p>\n

And as always, we will continue in our reporting to dig wherever there are secret deals the public should know about, and bring these to light.<\/p>\n

For further comment, please contact:
\nMurray Hunter, acting advocacy coordinator \u2014 0726725468<\/em><\/p>\n

*Photo: Ashraf Hendricks\/GroundUp.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ruling in president versus protector matter a setback, but the game\u2019s not over.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20336,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11069","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-advocacy"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11069","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11069"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11069\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20336"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11069"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11069"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/further.co.za\/amabwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11069"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}