Parliament TV, best thing since sliced bread

ONE has to seriously consider investing in a power bank, new phone charger or even better, a new cellphone which has a battery that lasts up to three days without the need of charging it.

Why all this you may ask? The answer is simple: I will be spending more time on my phone following all debates that go down in Parliament.

For 15 years I have been a Parliament reporter and hey years ago I even won an award for it, but looking back one can tell that my readers were cheated of great stories.

Do not get me wrong my colleagues and I tried to capture all the debates, but within njwayelo the mind would tend to focus on submissions made by certain individuals while totally ignoring others.

For example, it was a given that one would write whatever submission was made by the late former prime minister Barnabas Dlamini (may his soul rest in peace), former Senate president Gelane Zwane and obviously, veteran politician Lobamba Lomdzala MP Marwick Khumalo. They did make great submissions, but I am sure on some days their colleagues made even better ones.

By the time the next day comes to write leftover stories most of the submissions are already overtaken by events.

Which is why I am now jolly excited about the launch of the Parliament TV or studio as you can log on anytime. When the king launched the studio during the State opening a month ago, I bet a majority of us did not fully comprehend what the benefits of the E6 million studio according to Clerk to Parliament Benedict Xaba were.

I remember during Parliament opening my colleagues kept posting pictures of some of the legislators and I had no idea who some of them were. But soon after that the Parliament debates went live especially those of the budget debate and, it is pure joy.

Of course newsrooms have their own polices on how to approach stories so sometimes you flip the paper from front to back and you do not find the stories, but hey there’s that beauty called YouTube, which stores almost everything and some of our politicians will have nowhere to hide.

For example, some of my friends were upset that they could not access the debate of the ministry of information, communication and technology where the Minister Savannah Maziya alleged that she had been relieved of her duties.

When asked, Xaba said like with all new technology there were technical glitches and he said the main challenge was that they could not record live sittings at the same time. However, when the recording was eventually aired on YouTube it was only 25 minutes long instead of the three hours, which was how the debate was.

But I will forgive Xaba, these are still baby steps, but he should remember that this project was launched by the king and he said finally people will see how Monarchical Democracy works where everyone is given a chance to talk.

Last Thursday I took a visit to the House of Assembly, but I had to leave early as I had other assignments to handle.

READ MORE | Govt to address issues undermining welfare of teachers

This was during the PM’s Office budget debate where once again Minister of Tinkhundla Administration Sikhumbuzo Dlamini was adamant that he did not know where the 16 million allocation from his ministry had come from.

I watched as Dlamini challenged all his Cabinet colleagues to own up to it, to which no one did. I had to chuckle at one point as the Minister of Commerce, Industry and Trade Manqoba Khumalo buried his face in his hands as Dlamini went on a tirade. And this is not to single out Minister Khumalo, but it was something that was live.

It should be a lesson to the ministers and other legislators that there is now ‘big brother’ in the Parliament chamber.

This also gives constituents a chance to question their representatives on presentations that were made in the chamber.

They can now question their MPs and say “what was your contribution when, for example the elderly grant issue was debated?”.

Many constituents complain that some of them have never heard their MPs make submissions.

I am not sure when the live radio broadcast will be launched but it is clear that kusatoba mnandzi indeed.

I think the live broadcasts will also ensure that journalists are the watchdogs which we are supposed to be and we do not fall into a trap where the legislators buy us lunch to have their submissions published even though the submission was mediocre.

The downside of this Parliament TV is that chances are we will be glued to our screens without a care of what else is going on around us.

This is also a challenge to our female legislators because as they will soon be going on a tirade of khetsamake in the next election we want to hear their submissions.

Until next week do not forget to be kind and do stock up on data.