'Constitution needs to be amended,' says ANC chief whip Pemmy Majodina

• Pemmy Majodina joined the growing call for an amendment of the Constitution. 
• Majodina said the current Constitution was initially meant for transitional purposes, to accommodate everyone. 
• Cyril Ramaphosa said it was time to evaluate whether the Constitution still served the aspirations of the majority.

ANC chief whip Pemmy Majodina called for the amendment of the country's Constitution, saying it was initially meant for transitional purposes and that it no longer served the needs of the majority. 

"This is the 25th anniversary of the Constitution, and that Constitution needs to be amended. Remember, this was a transitional Constitution, actually, to accommodate everyone," said Majodina.

She said the Constitution was no longer serving the needs of the majority.

She made the remarks during the start of the ANC parliamentary caucus' three-day lekgotla at Birchwood Hotel in Johannesburg on Friday. 

Two days ago, President Cyril Ramaphosa said: "It is about time that we reflect on the constitutional architecture of the country to reflect on its efficiency to the extent that it has served the aspirations of our people."

He was delivering the keynote address on the first day of the three-day national conference on the Constitution, titled "Reflections and the Road Ahead". 

READ | It's time to reflect on whether Constitution has 'served aspirations of our people' - Ramaphosa

The lekgotla is meant as an opportunity for the ANC to account to the party's leadership on what its MPs had been able to achieve and what challenges they faced.

Majodina said: "This is our last parliamentary lekgotla for this [sixth] administration as we are left with only 12 months before the elections and, as the governing ANC party, we must take stock of what we had committed to doing. 

"We need to account as to what was our responsibility as MPs from the governing party, which are the bills that we have passed. If there are bills that we have not passed, then we need to account as to what are the hiccups to passing these bills," said Majodina.

In terms of measuring the achievements of ANC MPs, Majodina said she would give them a seven out of 10. 

"We have 57% of the seats in the National Assembly and, when we wanted to pass Section 25, which is a very critical piece of legislation to return the land to our people, we were unable to do that because those who are enjoying our land mobilised against us," said Majodina. 

She said Parliament was doing its job in terms of passing budgets, "but there are certain departments that are underspending in government. Therefore, we want to come up with a remedy, regarding what we then do with a department that is underspending". 

Majodina added that the lekgotla served as an opportunity for the ANC machinery "to oil itself up" in preparation for the looming elections.