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Parliament’s former deputy security chief is taking his case to the Public Protector exactly a year after he was suspended, claiming the legislature did not follow due process after suspending him and ultimately getting rid of him.
Motlatsi Mokgatla told City Press this week: “I was never charged. I was never called in for a hearing. They say they couldn’t find me.”
Mokgatla’s contract with Parliament ended last December, while he was suspended. He says when the contract came up for renewal, Parliament just allowed it to lapse and never informed him that it would not be renewed.
Parliament says Mokgatla absconded and it could not find him to serve the charges or communicate decisions about his contract.
The legislature insisted this week that due process had been followed, and that charges were drafted and sent to Mokgatla’s address numerous times.
“Mokgatla’s condition of suspension included a requirement for him to be contactable at all times and to inform Parliament of any change regarding his contact details,” said Parliament’s spokesperson, Luzuko Jacobs.
“Mr Mokgatla did not keep to this condition and absconded.”
Jacobs said Mokgatla did not answer any telephone calls or respond to messages from management. Notices of the charge sheet and several letters relating to the disciplinary action were sent, including via registered mail, to no avail, making it impossible for Parliament to reach him.
Mokgatla was Parliament’s deputy head of security from 2006 until last year.
When Parliament suspended him and his then boss, Zelda Holtzman, on full pay in July last year, it said they were being investigated for alleged security breaches and issues affecting Parliament protection services.
According to several documents, including court papers that City Press has seen, Holtzman and Mokgatla objected to the use of blue-light vehicles by the secretary to Parliament, Gengezi Mgidlana, saying it was not the duty of Parliament’s protection services to drive him around.
They also questioned the recruitment of active police officers into Parliament security as bouncers.
In a memorandum to Parliament’s presiding officers, Baleka Mbete and Thandi Modise, Mokgatla and Holtzman accused Mgidlana of sidelining them in the project to beef up security in Parliament, saying this was a result of their “refusal to be forced to carry out functions where the legal basis of those actions is questionable”.
Last month, Holtzman was acquitted of 11 of the 14 charges brought against her, with the most serious guilty verdict being for failure to develop a strategic or business plan for Parliament.
Meanwhile, the National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union (Nehawu) won a tactical battle on Friday when the disciplinary hearings of six employees were postponed to August 15.
The six employees, four of whom are Nehawu shop stewards, were individually charged following two staff meetings held towards the end of June, which were disrupted.
The employees’ lawyer, Barnabas Xulu, said it was improper for Parliament to identify and charge individuals instead of dealing with the union, as all the issues involved are union-employer issues and not related to individual employees.
“A disciplinary hearing is not the right forum. These issues should be dealt with in the collective bargaining and recognition set-up.”
Xulu said that by charging union members, and shop stewards, in particular, and the chairperson of the union, Parliament was engaging in “union-bashing”.
He said a decision would be made on August 15 on whether the internal Parliament disciplinary process had been the correct forum for the issues.
“If they decide against us, we will go to the labour court,” he added.
