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Durban businessman Kwanele Gumbi is facing a revolt in the council of Johannesburg’s The Market theatre after he tried to pay himself a R100 000 Christmas bonus.
Gumbi, who was reappointed as council chair this month by Arts and Culture Minister Nathi Mthethwa, is also accused of using The Market staff to book him and his family’s trips to events, and appearing to take the credit for Ndebele artist Esther Mahlangu’s honorary doctorate from the University of Johannesburg last week.
“He’s gone rogue. He’s like the Hlaudi [Motsoeneng] of the theatre world,” said one of numerous staff members City Press spoke to after a dramatic staff meeting on Wednesday.
At the meeting, they say, Gumbi berated the theatre’s chief executive Ismail Mahomed and chief financial officer Christine Mcdonald after they raised audit concerns relating to him in December.
Sources said Gumbi threatened to make Mcdonald report directly to him and accused her of lying about his expenses.
Gumbi is under investigation by a joint sitting of the council and its audit committee.
At the meeting, Gumbi declared himself innocent of nine charges – including the attempted R100 000 bonus payout – of interfering in the theatre’s operations, exploiting its state-funded coffers, attempting to exploit Mahlangu and using the theatre to promote his political ambitions.
The staff are now divided.
Theatre spokesperson Lusanda Zokufa said: “There was an independent investigation done, and it was submitted and adopted by the Market Theatre Foundation council. In all the allegations against [Gumbi], there were no transgressions, no financial improprieties and no wrongdoing.”
But numerous sources close to the old and new councils denied this.
“He was far from cleared. In fact, the audit committee was to be tasked to do a forensic [investigation] on his travel and other allowances,” said one.
Another said: “The old council received a report from the audit committee with their findings and made remedial recommendations. There were no pronouncements of ‘guilty’ or ‘not guilty’. The process will be resumed when new council is sworn in.”
The department of arts and culture, which oversees The Market theatre, responded with alarm.
Department spokesperson Zimasa Velaphi said: “The department wishes to thank you for bringing the issues to its attention.”
Velaphi asked for time to investigate the allegations before responding fully.
The allegations date back to 2012 and 2015, when former theatre chief executive Annabell Lebethe wrote two letters to the council warning that Gumbi was involving himself in operational matters.
She claimed he instructed junior staff to make bookings for him and his children to attend events such as the National Arts Festival in Grahamstown. Lebethe declined to comment this week.
Similar allegations were raised in December, including that he billed the council “excessively” and instructed the HR department to withhold bonuses from Mahomed and Mcdonald, and reduce Mahomed’s salary.
A council chair may not be involved in operational matters.
Zokufa declined to respond to detailed questions, saying she could not “divulge internal workings until they have been fully and successfully resolved”.
At this week’s meeting, Gumbi allegedly denied trying to pay himself the R100 000 bonus, and a R75 000 bonus to council members.
He said it was instead an “honorarium” and implied he had Mthethwa’s backing.
A letter from Mthethwa that City Press obtained, however, shows the minister refused to allow the payment because it defied public finance laws.
Sources told City Press that Gumbi charges R3 000 to attend meetings – R1 500 to prepare and R1 500 to attend the actual meeting.
The audit investigation is dealing with claims that Gumbi bills up to 15 times a month for meetings and theatre-related events – up to R45 000.
This week, Gumbi allegedly challenged Mcdonald’s calculations that R586 000 was spent on his travel, accommodation and car rentals in less than a year, saying this was spent over two years.
When Mcdonald offered to fetch documents to prove her case, Gumbi allegedly snapped: “I didn’t ask you to speak. This is not your meeting. I’ve never worked for something so little in my life, never. It upsets me a great deal. I send three kids to private schools. You know? Can you imagine, at R1 300 per meeting? It’s only a township school where I can afford to take them.”
One of the charges against Gumbi involves the theatre’s Esther Mahlangu Project, where the grand dame of Ndebele art painted her work on three of the theatre’s buildings.
But, sources say, “the regulatory process in commissioning the project was not followed”, and Gumbi “gave false assurance to Mahlangu that, if she paints works at The Market theatre for much reduced rates, then the theatre will help her raise funds to build an art school in Mpumalanga”.
Sources said the theatre had no capacity to raise the funds.
On Gumbi’s Facebook page attached to the ANC’s Mayibuye campaign, he posts videos of the project with Mahlangu.
Last year, he announced the launch of his manifesto for contesting the ANC presidency.
He also implied, say staff, that through his acquaintance with University of Johannesburg vice-chancellor Tshilidzi Marwala, he had something to do with the honorary doctorate bestowed on Mahlangu last week.
The university’s executive dean of art, design and architecture, Federico Freschi, denied this, saying he and the dean of the law faculty nominated Mahlangu for the doctorate.
This week, say sources, Gumbi threatened to get rid of the theatre’s chief financial officer and “visit” his enemies in the department. He also claimed to have the power to get the executive to report to him.
He told staff: “I’ll be changing some of your assignments. I’m going to come in closer than before – and that’s not operationally interfering.”
But he later said: “A number of the issues I’ve had to deal with are operational, I agree, because those who are meant to make decisions can’t. And when they do, they make wrong ones that are contrary to what we stand for, then I interfere. Believe me, I come and make decisions.”
The staff say Gumbi angrily dismissed reservations that he was not sufficiently qualified to head the theatre’s council.
“I was called uneducated, unskilled and corrupt. And I’m surprised how this uneducated, corrupt black person that sits here came back.”
Gumbi has post-matric certificates, was a Gagasi FM host and won season five of MTN Gladiators in 2002.
A Companies and Intellectual Property Commission check of his many directorships of companies returns the result that 13 have been deregistered and two are in the process of being deregistered.
