Acting Public Protector Kholeka Gcaleka has received just over the necessary 60%, or 240 votes, in the National Assembly to be the next boss of this constitutionally enshrined institution supporting democracy. Thursday was an unruly sitting, with the EFF absent and the DA walking out.

It was always going to be a tense, tight vote. And it turned out to be raucous and chaotic before the roll-call vote that came down to 244 for and 12 against, with no votes from either the 84 DA MPs, who walked out, the 44 EFF MPs who were absent, or the United Democratic Movement, Pan Africanist Congress or Cope.

The trigger was DA MP Glynnis Breytenbach's refusal to withdraw the comment on the recommended new Public Protector Kholeka Gcaleka's "very cosy relationship, some say intimate relationship, with her boss, the rather odious Menzi Simelane, led to speedy promotions..."

The ANC objected to the insinuation that Gcaleka secured jobs with sexual favours:

"... (W)e can't allow to have such an insinuation in the House, given what we have gone through as women in this country," said Human Settlements Minister Mmamoloko Kubayi.

National Assembly Speaker Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula ruled the comments were a disallowed negative reflection on a person in public office. She ordered Breytenbach to withdraw or leave the House. Breytenbach left.

The DA challenged the ruling as incorrect, arguing that Gcaleka was not yet approved by the House to be the Public Protector. And she was not before the...