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EX-MATSAPHA COUNCIL MANAGER DEMANDS E3.3M

23/10/2020 08:15:00 BY SIBUSISO ZWANE

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MANZINI – Princess Kholwaphi, the former Matsapha Town Council Corporate Services Manager (CSM) is demanding E3.3 millon from the council as terminal benefits for alleged constructive dismissal.

The actual amount that the princess is demanding is E3 363 735 and this is contained in a claim which the princess, through her legal representatives; Sibusiso B. Shongwe and Associates, filed at the Industrial Court on October 15, 2020.

The veracity of these allegations is yet to be tested in court and the respondent (Matsapha Town Council) is yet to file its responding papers.

Claim

According to the claim, the princess was employed as a CSM on a fixed term contract by the respondent (council), which commenced on October 1, 2018 and was supposed to end on September 30, 2021. She claimed that her position directly reported to the Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Lucky Sukati, and in terms of council’s organogram, she was second in charge in the organisation’s operations.

However, she claimed that in a quest to distract her focus from her core business and to allegedly make her employment intolerable and her stay with council unbearable, the CEO, in an allegedly well-calculated onslaught, subjected her to incessant agonising treatment and torture, which persisted from February 2019, to date thereof.

“The CEO orchestrated a well-calculated, unprecedented, discriminatory, and illegitimate inquiry into my academic qualifications in the form of unreasonable demands for an academic certificate for her first degree and authentication of same knowing very well that neither his nor the other employees had ever been authenticated by any accredited institution,” she claimed.

The princess also purported that there was allegedly no legal basis for the demand for certificate authentication by the CEO because she, as a holder of a Master of Business Administration, this invariably meant that she did possess a first degree. Furthermore, she submitted that she was already in gainful employment by council and questions about her qualifications had been determined by the Board before her appointment.

She added that there was allegedly no legitimate basis for the CEO to seek that she should produce her certificate for her first degree because the recruitment agency engaged by council; AM Recruitment and the Board of council, which dealt with and approved her employment, had been satisfied with her qualifications. She said this was after they had conducted their own investigations.

“As trust deteriorated between me and the CEO, he, in a quest to frustrate me, further marginalised me from my responsibilities and usurped same,” the princess claimed.

She said the CEO allegedly brought pressure on her by allegedly making unreasonable demands for service delivery. She alleged that Sukati requested the Royal Eswatini Police Service (REPS) to investigate her for fraud and dispossessed her of her computer, which had all the information on the confrontational exchanges that had happened between her and the CEO during the period of her alleged harassment and victimisation.

Insult

Again, she alleged that in a widely publicised insult, which amounted to sexual harassment of a professional, Christian and married woman, the CEO allegedly branded her employment with council as having been based on a sexual relationship between her and the chairman of the Board. She claimed that these were unfounded, malicious accusations and her marriage together with her social relationships were strained, while her service delivery was distracted.

She claimed that later on, the CEO allegedly trumped up a disciplinary charge of fraud, which was decorated with other serious charges that caused her sleepless nights and health challenges.

On top of that, she also alleged that the CEO allegedly unfairly influenced the Minister of Housing and Urban Development Prince Simelane and the Principal Secretary, Clifford Mamba, who were responsible for the affairs of council, to refer her request for ministerial intervention against her harassment and victimisation by Sukati back to his office and REPS to continue torturing her with unfounded hearings and investigations.

“Such investigations continued even after my forced resignation,” the princess alleged.

She alleged that even after she had resigned, the CEO allegedly continued to withhold her earned leave and benefits, forcing her to suffer unending trauma through the alleged abuse of her financial resources in unnecessary litigation in pursuit of his alleged convoluted vendetta against her.

The princess further alleged that after having allegedly meted unbearable, unfair and illegal treatment to her as indicated above, the CEO allegedly successfully forced her to resign as their working relationship became toxic, causing her emotional trauma from public embarrassment, workplace misfit and a social burden to her relatives.