However, let me not get distracted by this odd desk and the Cape Town of Us and Them but rather focus on Buti Manamela, the Deputy Minister in the Presidency. I do so not because Mr Manamela sits in Mr Zuma’s Cabinet or because he has a campaign desk but rather because he has the knack for bringing toy guns and cloth into a sitting of the People’s Assembly. It is probably best just to call it Parliament given the recent conduct of the Speaker, and the other office-bearers, to rely on special security to compel compliant behaviour.

President Zuma’s budget vote on Wednesday was always going to be eventful. So it should be no surprise that the Democratic Alliance’s Mmusi Maimane would go on to call Mr Zuma an “accused criminal”. This is to be expected, especially following the Constitutional Court decision of 31 March 2016 and the North Gauteng High Court decision of 29 April 2016.

We are not talking about a Penny Sparrow or a Matthew Theunissen but rather about a man who serves as a deputy minister in the South African Executive. The role of a deputy minister is not to be taken lightly especially when you consider that the public purse spends R1,901,726 on Mr Manamela’s salary, which is a fraction of the total Executive salary bill for the 2015/16 financial year of R158,681,407.

The salary we pay Mr Manamela allows him to go down to a local shop – hopefully he is supporting the local Cape Town economy especially since there appears to be an intention to relocate Parliament in the near future– to purchase a water gun and some cloth to make a theatrical point of giving Julius Malema and Mmusi Maimane a gift. The generosity of Mr Manamela knows no bounds, clearly. Stunts seem to be the order of the day and solutions are far from that odd place that is used from time to time as a legislative precinct although it is more about theatrics today.

For R1.9-million, we have enabled our Deputy Minister to stand in Parliament and wave around a toy gun (not just any toy gun but a water pistol) and some cloth. Of course, the water pistol is a retort to Mr Malema’s claim that he and the Economic Freedom Fighters will remove the governing party through the barrel of a gun, but it is unfortunate that we must be subjected to such childish retorts. Let me also not forget that Mr Manamela had some blue fabric for Mr Maimane as an apparent jab for the use of fabric at the Democratic Alliance’s recent manifesto launch in Johannesburg.

Unfortunately, the focus of our engagement on this issue will be weighed down by a toy gun and the words of parliamentarians, which is apparently inappropriate. The focus of our engagement in the Fifth Parliament really does seem to be a farce. Our attention seems transfixed and mesmerised by the theatrics of our well-to-do parliamentarians (not by their own doing but rather at the expense of South Africans). All of this sadly has become the usual antics of the day.

The public purse goes a very long way if our deputy ministers are able to spend it on toy guns and fabric to make a point. However, I would hope that our parliamentarians and political leaders would rely more on the substance of their argument and the interest of the public that they are required to serve to guide their future conduct.

But it is an election year and the focus over the next three months will be consumed by the political point-scoring and the games that are required. However, those games will not solve the crisis that we face as a country where accountability has been shirked and where our democratic institutions have been used to protect a particular man and his agenda.

A toy gun, heated words and some cloth will not absolve any of us from the issues around Mr Zuma, his Cabinet colleagues and the system that continues to enable people, with questionable motives, to play games at the expense of South Africans. DM

Correction: The original version of this column contained an inaccurate statement that “the Inkatha Freedom Party’s Mangosuthu Buthelezi would go on to say that ‘Zuma must voetsek’”. We apologise to Mr Buthelezi.

Correction: In this column’s original headline Mr Manamela’s surname was spelt incorrectly. We apologise for the error.