THE North Gauteng High Court has set aside Public Protector advocate Busisiwe Mkhwebane’s report that found Road Traffic Management Corporation (RTMC) boss Makhosini Msibi unfairly hired an administration assistant.
Acting judge Livhuwani Vuma ruled that the whole report was flawed.
He said Mkhwebane failed to afford Msibi an opportunity to give his side of the story before the report was released.
“The minute the public protector found that the three complaints she found to be meritorious detrimentally implicated the applicant and that an adverse finding may result therefrom, she was enjoined to grant him a hearing, which she failed and/or neglected to do,” said the judge.
“Even her ‘no difference’ argument that an accused person’s right not a fair procedure may be dispensed with if it can later be demonstrated that affording him fair process would not have aided him is assailable. This is given that no person or administrator is permitted to second-guess with impunity what the outcome of their investigations and findings may have been but for their neglect to put paid to section 33(1) of the Constitution in regard to procedural fairness to a party,” added the judge.
The public protector found that the process of employing Julia Manamela in November 2014 was not fair.
Before her employment at RTMC, she was a receptionist at a lodge where Msibi was accommodated.
Mkhwebane said her appointment “raised eyebrows” as it appeared that the RTMC “deliberately manipulated the process with the intention to employ Manamela permanently”.
Manamela was promoted to position of supply chain management practitioner and her salary increased threefold in six months, from just over R130 000 per annum to R333 000. She was the only one vying for the post.
Mkhwebane also found that Msibi’s appointment of senior counsels, or advocates, to handle disciplinary processes – which did not require such high levels of expertise – amounted to irregular expenditure and that he improperly approved excessive payments to his bodyguards.
“It was in my view the applicant’s argument that her processes are flawed given their inconsistencies with Constitution is tenable,” said Vuma.
