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The Labour Court has granted the Tshwane municipality a green light to subject five employees implicated in the infamous Rooiwal tender to a new disciplinary hearing.
This comes after the court dismissed the employees’ application to interdict the new disciplinary hearings instituted against them.
The City of Tshwane formulated new charges against Stevens Notoane (group head: water and sanitation), Thembeka Mphefu (divisional head: supply chain), Frans Manganye (divisional head: electricity planning), Justice Sekokotla (director: electricity), and Dumisani Gubuza (divisional head: water and sanitation).
They are accused of aiding Blackhead, a company owned by ANC funder Edwin Sodi, to get the R291m tender in 2019.
These charges arise from findings by the Special Investigation Unit (SIU), which concluded that the Blackhead Joint Venture’s tender failed to include essential technical specifications.
The SIU further found that these required documents did not exist at the time they were purportedly required and were only submitted approximately two years after the tender had been awarded to the Blackhead Joint Venture. The investigation also found that this discrepancy should have been evident to the officials, particularly because other bidders had submitted the correct documentation.
“The SIU also uncovered material omissions by the Blackhead Joint Venture regarding their functionality evaluation, relevant experience of staff, contactable references, key personnel, and, despite the same, the applicants were awarded these specs extremely high scores, in some cases full marks.” The court judgment reads
“The new evidence elevates the misconduct of the applicants from mere ineptitude to dishonest intent to engineer the tender evaluation to ensure that the Blackhead Joint Venture was the preferred (and in fact the only) bidder.”
According to the court papers, charge one relates specifically to the applicants’ alleged deliberate failure to disqualify the Blackhead Joint Venture despite its submission of a non-responsive tender.
The tender allegedly omitted Addendum 1 and the required returnable documents, including the RDE5 and RDE6 forms. It is alleged that this conduct amounted to the intentional manipulation of the tender evaluation process in order to favour the Blackhead Joint Venture.
Charge two concerns the alleged contravention of the City of Tshwane’s Code of Conduct and internal policies.
Upon learning the new intended disciplinary hearings, the five officials launched an urgent court bid at the Labour Court to halt the intended proceedings, which were scheduled for June and July 2026.
In dismissing their application, Judge Benita Mandy Whitcher found that there can be no doubt that the city did not act unlawfully when it made the decision to institute the 2026 disciplinary proceedings against the applicants.
“There is no allegation that the COT [City of Tshwane] had no legal authority to act. To the extent such is relevant, I find the review application has poor prospects of success.”
In 2023, the disciplinary committee found the five officials guilty on one charge and sanctioned them with the docking of one month’s salary, but the city took the outcome on review at the Labour Court on the grounds that the sanction was too lenient given the seriousness of the offence.
The Labour Court remitted the matter back to the disciplinary committee to be heard afresh by a different panel.
The City of Tshwane welcomed the Labour Court judgment.
“The judgment has vindicated the city’s dogged pursuit to bring new charges, in addition to the initial raft of charges, against the implicated officials and subject them to a disciplinary process, underscoring the importance of allowing established labour law processes to take their course without any hindrance,” Lindela Mashigo, city spokesperson, said.
Sowetan
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