Junior employee at municipality fired ‘for rejecting advances’

A junior employee at Gauteng’s Lesedi municipality was suspended and dismissed after allegedly rejecting a senior manager’s repeated sexual advances, with an independent investigation finding “prima facie” evidence of sexual harassment and victimisation.

Fired and victimised after sexual advances

When the training and development officer reported the harassment and abuse of power, allegedly by the municipal manager, Sibusiso Dlamini, she was suspended and subsequently fired on alleged trumped up charges.

She was allegedly left without her salary and benefits for about nine months, with the alleged unfair labour practice dispute set to be heard by the South African Local Government Bargaining Council in Benoni on Monday.

The alleged victimisation did not end there. Her electricity was cut off and the municipality went as far as removing her electricity meter box – an action her lawyers argued formed part of the broader victimisation.

Municipal manager’s actions ‘reprehensible’

The case follows an external investigation into the sexual harassment allegations in which the investigator found evidence that Dlamini, who had not replied to a request for comment, had subjected the complainant to sexual harassment and victimisation.

The investigation report, dated 16 April last year, described the conduct attributed to the manager as “reprehensible” and that it should be “deprecated”.

Report’s recommendations

“The [municipality] should take stern action against [Dlamini]. Victimisation of employees should not be tolerated. There is prima facie evidence that [Dlamini] has subjected the complainant to sexual harassment and victimisation, which resulted her suspension, dismissal,” the investigation found.

The report recommended Dlamini be subjected to a disciplinary inquiry and be placed on precautionary suspension, pending the disciplinary process. It also recommended Dlamini immediately lift the employee’s suspension, finding that it had been orchestrated with an ulterior motive and was based on unsubstantiated allegations.

The investigator also recommended that Lesedi consider paying the employee the nine months’ salary she lost, on the basis that she should not have been dismissed in the first place.

In March last year, Lesedi mayor Mluleki Nkosi approved Dlamini’s request for special leave of absence in the wake of the sexual harassment allegations. He was, however, allegedly allowed to keep his salary and take part in key municipality decisions.

Thobeka Zondi, the infrastructure manager, was appointed to act on the position.

According to allegations and correspondence, the employee claimed she faced adverse treatment after raising concerns about alleged sexual harassment and abuse of power involving Dlamini.

The investigation report recommended that Dlamini face a disciplinary inquiry. However, the employee alleged that no disciplinary inquiry against Dlamini had yet been instituted. She alleged Dlamini challenged the investigation findings through a review application, while the municipality had not proceeded with the recommended disciplinary process.

Extra charges on municipal account

She also alleged charges and penalties were subsequently loaded onto her municipal account.

Her lawyers had since lodged a dispute with the municipality, arguing she was targeted for reporting the sexual harassment and abuse of power. The municipality’s corporate and legal services manager Andrew Machitje said the matter was in the High Court in Johannesburg and therefore sub judice.

“Both parties in the matter have made submissions in the high court, and those submissions include facts on dispute, are pending to be ventilated before the competent presiding officer,” he said.

Machitje added The Citizen’s detailed questions sought to undermine the rule of law and the parties’ right to be heard fairly in court.

“Any reports from the newspaper which compromises the integrity of this matter will be reported to the relevant regulatory body and to the competent court for appropriate remedial action,” he warned.

Labour cases had repeatedly demonstrated that sexual harassment by managers and senior employees can constitute serious workplace misconduct, particularly where a position of authority is used to pursue a subordinate.

In October 2011, the Labour Appeal Court upheld the dismissal of an Anglo Platinum senior human resources manager who had repeatedly demanded sex from his subordinate, despite her rejecting his advances over a prolonged period.

In December 2016, a senior anaesthesiologist and head of department at George Hospital in the Western Cape was dismissed after being found guilty of four sexual harassment charges involving a 26-year-old junior doctor working under his supervision. The Labour Appeal Court dealt with the matter in October 2020, finding three of the alleged incidents constituted sexual harassment.

In May 2016, the Labour Court upheld the dismissal of a Southern Sun employee who was found guilty of sexual harassment after asking a subcontractor’s employee for sex in exchange for deleting nude photographs of her from his cellphone.

These cases demonstrated repeated unwanted sexual advances, particularly where there was a power imbalance, had resulted in disciplinary consequences in the public and private sectors.

This comes in the backdrop of SA’s persistent gender-based violence crisis, with the first South African National Gender-Based Violence Study, released in 2024, revealing that 35.8% of women had experienced physical and sexual violence in their lifetime.