Munier had the good fortune (or misfortune) of attending the State of the Nation Address last year.
He was seated on the edge of the press box, right next to the foreign dignitaries’ gallery and with a bird’s eye view of the president’s blink kop.
He shook the hands of a few larney ambassadors, who were all excited and wanted to know what the media expected from the first sitting of the National Assembly.
Of course, no one could anticipate the three-ring circus that would play out – the disruptions, shouting matches, childish insults, walkouts and WWE wrestling action between EFF MPs and parliamentary security.
The foreign contingent looked uneasy and cast wide-eyed looks at the journos.
All Munier could do was force a toothy smile and shrug his shoulders sheepishly.
And when Jacob Zuma eventually got to address the house (or half thereof), all hell broke loose outside, where disgruntled party supporters clashed with cops and ran amok in the city’s streets.
That was last year. This year was pretty much an action replay, except 400 troops were deployed in the CBD for crowd control.
Inside the house, the EFF’s “honourable members” were up to their old tricks, rising on a point of order before Zuma could even clear his throat.
The DA decided that Sona was a good opportunity to mourn the deaths of over 100 mental patients in the care of the Gauteng Health Department.
They arrived with flags bearing the words “Remembering the Esidimeni 94” and insisted on observing a minute’s silence – during the president’s address.
But let’s face it, the request was less about the tragedy and more about disrupting Sona and taking a swipe at the ANC in Gauteng.
After an exhausting and shameful 80 minutes of shenanigans, JZ eventually returned to the podium, did his famous chuckle and got on with his speech.
At this point, the Daily Voice team (and newsrooms around the country) had pulled all their hair out and prepared for a late night at the office.
And so the disruptors managed to divert all attention from critical matters like slow economic growth, the drought, education funding and land redistribution.
The finer points of the “National Development Plan” had been drowned out by the noise.
The quality of the Sona debate this week was not much better.
In all our years, Parliament has never been such a shambles.
To be brutally honest, most of our MPs – the people we’ve elected to lead South Africa – are nothing but a disrespectful childish lot of clowns who are doing a huge disservice to this country.
And they are disgracing themselves before the international diplomatic and business community.
Shame on you.
They have no respect for Parliament, the important office they hold and the citizens of South Africa.
They are not worthy of the title “honourable member”.
The ruling party would have realised that this gemors is likely to drag on until 2019, as long as Zuma – who has clearly lost the respect of the house – is in power.
And there’s nothing Baleka Mbete can do to enforce the house rules.
The ANC government was never as weak and treated with disdain under previous presidents Nelson Mandela and Thabo Mbeki.