Durban Metro Supresses Investigation To Win Court Battle

eThekwini in hot water after allegedly misleading Supreme Court of Appeal.

- Jonathan Erasmus

THE ETHEKWINI METRO COULD FIND itself in a seriously compro-mised position if allegations that it misled the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) are found to be true.

In May 2017 the council appealed an order granted by the High Court in Durban for a multi-level, halfbuilt, 11-storey luxury building on Durban’s Berea to be demolished (nose190&212). Lawyers for the metro council argued at the SCA hearing that eThekwini shouldn’t be held accountable for the unauthorised actions of just one employee – “the administration official” – and downplayed the “errors” to argue that the demolition order granted was excessive.

The city told the SCA judges that, to the extent that there were irregularities, they were of a “far lower order of severity”; there was no evidence that the municipality had acted in a “biased and fraudulent manner”; and the city’s infractions that might lead to liability for the council, were not exceptional as there was “no evidence of bad faith, fraud or corruption on the part of the administrative official”.

The SCA upheld the appeal in favour of the council.

But Noseweek has discovered that a 36-page report completed in December 2015 by Mbuso Ngcobo, head of the City Integrity and Investigative Unit (CIIU) – which has since been kept hidden from public view – reveals that eThekwini was fully aware, when arguing before the SCA, that in fact it was not just one staff member’s minor infraction – there were at least six senior employees involved and all had been found “in dereliction of duty” and to have failed to perform the functions of their office “in good faith, diligently, honestly and in a transparent manner”.