Speaker, yesterday and many times before, the Deputy President was at pains to explain how government intended to stop the spiralling abuse of public resources and state power by senior executives, both political and within the administration.
Yet, Cope has reliably established that the presidential military chopper was, during the past few days, parked at Umtata Airport, right in the middle of both runways. The result was that for an entire day no landings and take-offs were possible at Umtata Airport, and all SA Airways flights had to be rerouted to East London, with the resulting inconvenience and costs to those on board.
We have a constitutional democracy with an executive that should account to the people represented here in Parliament about their actions, programmes and activities. Surely it is not acceptable for state officials who transport and provide security to the President to inconvenience and flagrantly disregard the public of South Africa.
The blue-light brigades of executive members in provinces and at national level have on many occasions risked the lives of road users. Similarly, if the air force and very important persons unit responsible for the protection of the President are allowed to close down a civilian airport, like happened this week, our country is in more serious trouble than we would like to believe. Cope calls on the Minister to investigate this matter. Thank you. [Interjections.] [Applause.]