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Johannesburg - Communications Minister Faith Muthambi has moved to appeal a high court ruling that upheld that SABC COO Hlaudi Motsoeneng’s appointment was irrational.
On May 23, the Western Cape High Court’s Judge Dennis Davis dismissed the SABC and Motsoeneng’s application for leave to appeal that court’s November 2015 ruling on the COO.
In 2015, political party the Democratic Alliance (DA) launched a legal bid to overturn the appointment of Motsoeneng as SABC COO. Subsequently, the Western Cape High Court in November 2015 ruled that Motsoeneng’s appointment was irrational and unlawful, and must be set aside.
The November 2015 judgment centred on a report by Public Protector Thuli Madonsela which found that Motsoeneng had lied about his qualifications when applied for the SABC COO job.
The report further found that Motsoeneng had hiked his salary from R1.5m to R2.4m in one year, that he purged senior staff and irregularly increased salaries of various staff members.
But now Muthambi has applied to Bloemfontein’s Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) to seek leave to appeal the Western Cape High Court’s judgment on the matter.
Muthambi, in a petition filed with the SCA, said her decision to appoint Motsoeneng was rational and that she properly considered the Public Protector’s report.
“The Minister’s position set out in her answering affidavit was that she considered the Public Protector’s Report in detail before taking the decision and that she considered the merits of each of the allegations,” read Muthambi’s application with the SCA for leave to appeal, which was filed on June 22.
“She (Muthambi) concluded that in light of all the facts available to her, the findings of the Public Protector’s report ‘did not constitute a bar or indeed an impediment to the appointment of Mr Motsoeneng’,” read the application.
In the petition, Muthambi further said she needed to “take urgent steps” to fulfil the SABC COO position to ensure stability at the broadcaster.
Muthambi also said the SABC board had “deliberated” at great length over Motsoeneng's appointment as COO.
Amid the court battles, the DA secured a court order last year that forced the SABC to conduct a disciplinary hearing against Motsoeneng.
But that hearing subsequently cleared Motsoeneng of all charges.
Other controversies
Since then, Motsoeneng has pushed a controversial policy of not broadcasting visuals of protest action or burning of public buildings. The Independent Communications Authority of South Africa (Icasa) is set to hear a complaint of this editorial policy on Friday in Johannesburg.
Meanwhile, the SABC COO has also moved to adopt a 90% local content policy across the public broadcaster’s radio stations while TV station SABC 3 is set to have 80% local content in July.
The DA could not be reached by Fin24 for comment at the time of writing on Muthambi’s latest petition with the SCA.
