The President’s legal gambit to block the National Assembly’s Impeachment Committee is built on a single sentence buried in his founding affidavit. If Parliament proceeds with the Impeachment Committee while his review is pending, President Ramaphosa says he will seek an urgent interdict to stop it. The obstacles to this application may be more formidable than they appear, as it is a matter of constitutional law.
The review itself was filed on May 26, 2026, in the Western Cape High Court. The respondents are the three members of the Independent Panel: former Chief Justice Sandile Ngcobo, retired Judge Thokozile Masipa, and advocate Mahlape Sello SC, along with the Speaker of the National Assembly and ATM leader Vuyolwethu Zungula. The President’s primary goal is to overturn the Panel’s November 30, 2022, report, which concluded that the information before it disclosed, prima facie, that Ramaphosa may have committed serious constitutional violations or misconduct. The affidavit also seeks to invalidate any steps taken based on that report.
The Panel’s findings were never final. In December 2022, Ramaphosa attempted to challenge the report directly at the Constitutional Court, but the court declined to intervene. The matter became moot when the Assembly voted against proceeding. That changed in May 2026, when the Constitutional Court ruled in Economic Freedom Fighters v Speaker of the National Assembly that the Assembly’s previous gatekeeping rules were unconstitutional. The Panel’s report was now to be sent straight to the Impeachment Committee, bypassing the Speaker’s control.
Speaker Thoko Didiza acted swiftly. By May 13, 2026, she had formed a 31-member Impeachment Committee, drawing from all 16 parties in the Assembly. The shift ensured smaller parties had representation, departing from strict proportionality. The Committee’s mandate: to assess the Panel’s report and determine whether there is sufficient evidence to justify impeachment proceedings.
President’s Legal Strategy Unfolds
But the President’s legal strategy hinges on two distinct tracks. The first is the review itself—a challenge to the Panel’s methodology, thresholds, and scope. The second, far riskier, is the threat of an interdict to stop the Committee from meeting while the review plays out.
The President’s case rests on three legal flaws in the Panel’s report. First, the threshold question: Rule 129G(1)(b) requires the Panel to recommend whether sufficient evidence exists to show the President committed serious violations or misconduct. The Panel, however, applied a lower prima facie standard—whether there was a case to answer. The affidavit argues that the word “may” in the report’s conclusion does not meet the rule’s requirement for a finding of sufficient evidence.
Second, the bad faith requirement. Both “serious misconduct” and “a serious violation” are defined in the Assembly’s rules as requiring deliberate, intentional action in bad faith. The President’s case is that the Panel never examined whether the conduct was performed with bad faith—only whether it could have occurred. If correct, the Panel’s recommendation lacks a critical element.
Third, the scope exceedance. The Panel’s report devoted 20% of its findings to the source of foreign currency found at Phala Phala. None of the four original charges in the impeachment motion addressed this issue. The President argues the Panel exceeded its mandate by expanding into unrelated territory.
Supporting these arguments, the affidavit cites parallel investigations by the Public Protector, SARS, the Reserve Bank, the Joint Standing Committee on Intelligence, and the National Prosecuting Authority—all of which found either no violation or no basis for prosecution. While the President does not rely on these findings directly, they frame the broader context for the court.
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These are not minor legal points. The threshold question and the bad faith requirement raise genuinely contestable issues of constitutional interpretation. The President’s affidavit makes clear he wants these resolved through an expedited review, not through an interdict that halts the Committee’s work while the legal questions simmer.
Interdict Faces Significant Hurdles
An interdict to stop the Impeachment Committee would face at least four legal hurdles, each substantial on its own. The first is the Setlogelo standard, which demands a prima facie right not to face impeachment while a review is pending, a well-grounded apprehension of irreparable harm, a balance of convenience favoring relief, and the absence of an adequate alternative remedy. None of these is straightforward.
The prima facie right is weak. The Constitutional Court has framed Section 89 of the Constitution as one of the strongest accountability mechanisms in South Africa. A right to pause impeachment proceedings, even temporarily, is not self-evident, especially when the President retains all rights to contest the Committee’s findings before a final vote.
Irreparable harm is equally difficult to establish. Committee proceedings alone cannot remove the President from office. That requires a two-thirds majority vote of the full Assembly. Political or reputational pressure from ongoing hearings has never been treated as legally irreparable harm in South African jurisprudence.
The balance of convenience shifts heavily against the President. In National Treasury v Opposition to Urban Tolling Alliance (2012), the Constitutional Court ruled that when public power is at stake, courts must presume the validity of constitutional processes and be especially reluctant to grant interim relief that suspends them. The Impeachment Committee is not exercising discretion but is fulfilling a constitutionally mandated function, one the Constitutional Court itself ordered must proceed.
The deeper obstacle is jurisdictional. The Committee exists not because of the Panel’s report, but because the Constitutional Court ordered it into being. An interdict halting the Committee would not merely pause a procedural step; it would suspend compliance with a Constitutional Court order. No High Court has jurisdiction to do that. Only the Constitutional Court itself can vary or suspend its own orders, and even then, the threshold is set deliberately high to protect the finality of its judgments.
Constitutional Court Orders Prevail
When former President Jacob Zuma sought relief from the Constitutional Court’s order requiring his appearance before the State Capture Commission, the court rejected the argument that parallel litigation could suspend compliance. The message was clear: no court, including the High Court, can override a Constitutional Court order. If Ramaphosa wants the Committee halted, he must go back to the Constitutional Court, and even there, the path is steep.
The affidavit’s tone suggests as much. In paragraph 153, the President says he “trusts” an interdict will not be necessary. The preceding paragraph proposes that the parties agree on expedited review timelines, a far more plausible route. The right answer, legally and constitutionally, is an urgent but properly argued review. The President seems to know that.
