The President of South Africa, Jacob Zuma would not be delivering a planned speech in parliament on the state of his country after the speaker of parliament, Baleka Mbete, announced the postponement of the address.
Mbete said on Tuesday that the president’s state of the nation address, which had been scheduled for Thursday, would now be rescheduled following a week of dramatic events within the ruling African National Congress (ANC).
There is pressure on Mr. Zuma to step down as President as he faces another no confidence vote in the South African parliament later this month.
On Sunday when leaders of the African National Congress (ANC) met him, Mr. Zuma is reported by local media in an “arrogant” manner to have said that the “people still love him”.
Mr. Zuma refused to stepdown in that meeting which necessitated another meeting among the leadership of the ANC on Monday to discuss his future.
The embattled president reportedly told party’s leaders that he had done nothing wrong and that only the national executive committee (NEC) had the powers to recall him of which he requested to make a presentation to.
That request according to News24 was rejected with a source claiming “They told him we want to start an election campaign and we cannot do it with his face and with him in office with all his baggage, but he told them the people still love him”.
Mr. Zuma was expected to address the parliament on Thursday but a statement from the house said “We have, regrettably, come to the conclusion that there is little likelihood of an uneventful Joint Sitting of Parliament this coming Thursday.”
The statement further said that “With this in mind, we decided to approach the President of the Republic to propose that we postpone the Joint Sitting in order to create room for establishing a much more conducive political atmosphere in Parliament.”
The South African parliament also said “When we met the President, we then learnt that he was already writing to Parliament to ask for the postponement of SONA.”
A new date for the State of the Nation Address is now expected to be announced.
Source: Africafeeds.com
