Staff Reporter
WITH the National Assembly and Presidential candidate elections nearly two months away, the Republican Party (RP) is embroiled in a court battle over who should represent the party in Parliament.
The applicants, Markus Serafie and George Smeer, have taken the RP party, its president Henk Mudge, and two of its members, Helinde Tjiveze and Mathias Mbundu, to court after the party’s president replaced Serafie and Smeer as parliamentary representatives with Tjiveze and Mbundu.
This is not the first case of this nature, in July 2020, the Electoral Court gave the Popular Democratic Movement (PDM) party a wrist slap, ordering that political parties are not allowed to simply change their list of candidates nominated to be elected to the National Assembly after an election. This is after the PDM was found to have unconstitutionally replaced six of its party members on the party’s parliamentary list.
In the RP matter, the two applicants explained that the genesis of this dispute arises from certain events that took place after the National Assembly elections, which took place on the 27th of November 2019 (the elections).
“Political parties that participated in the elections were required, in terms of the provisions of s 77(1) of the Electoral Act, 2014 (‘the Act’), to submit to the Electoral Commission (the Commission) a list of its candidates for election as members of the National Assembly. The 1st Respondent (the RP party), in compliance with section 77(1) of the Act, submitted its party’s list, and the same was gazetted on the 6th of November 2019 in Government Gazette number 7041. The gazetted party’s lists included the names of the Applicants, as numbers two and four respectively,” the two applicants wrote in their heads of argument in the court case.
They added that after the election ended, the RP party attained two seats in the National Assembly. Consequently, this meant that the first two people on the party’s list would represent the RP as Parliamentarians in the National Assembly.
“The swearing-in of Parliamentarians was scheduled for the 19th of March 2020, and the 1st Applicant at this time was well aware that, being number two on the party’s list, he would be sworn in as the Parliamentarian representing the 1st Respondent. He also received a letter from the Commission inviting him to attend the swearing-in ceremony. This further cemented his belief and expectation to be the next Parliamentarian representing the 1st Respondent. The 3rd person on the party list was Clara Gowases, who passed away on the 15th of June 2019. Her unfortunate passing meant that the 2nd Applicant, being 4th on the party’s list, would have automatically been the next candidate. However, the 2nd Respondent, without any explanation to the 2nd Applicant, unilaterally decided to nominate the 3rd Respondent (Tjiveze) as a substitute for the vacancy caused by Ms Gowases’ passing,” Serafie and Smeer said.
They added that they are aggrieved by the RP and Mudge’s decision to skip them for representing the party in Parliament without their consent and without following any procedure to change the party’s list.
“The Respondents’ actions meant that the gazetted party’s list would not be followed chronologically, and the 2nd Respondent would decide willy-nilly who to nominate for Parliamentary positions that are vacant or have become vacant. It is therefore the Applicants’ submission that the swearing-in of the 3rd and 4th Respondents as members of the National Assembly is unconstitutional, unlawful, and illegal, and of no force or effect, on the basis that Mudge, the party’s president, or alternatively the 1st Respondent (the RP party), has no right to change the party’s list or act in a manner which is tantamount to changing the party’s list by skipping the Applicants when it is their turn to be nominated or sworn in as members of the National Assembly,” Serafie and Smeer said.
The case is postponed to 16 October 2024 at 09:00 for an Opposed Motion hearing.
