Aubrey Mokadi. Photo: Oupa Nkosi
Sacked vice-chancellor of the Vaal University of Technology (VUT) Aubrey Mokadi wants to be reinstated in his post for the third time, after charges of fraud and corruption against him were dropped two weeks ago.
Mokadi told the Mail & Guardian everyone who misused the instruments of justice to get him dismissed will be taken to book, although he is not yet considering suing the university. ”Anyway, this country needs to be taught a lesson. For how long will black people continue to be castigated as being corrupt and lazy?”
In 2006 the university council unanimously agreed to dismiss Mokadi after a disciplinary tribunal found him guilty of 22 incidents relating to fraud, corruption and abuse of power.
During the commission of inquiry more than 50 witnesses, including employees and former employees, testified under oath against Mokadi. The commission recommended the vice-chancellor be summarily dismissed without a disciplinary hearing and criminal charges be laid against him.
Separately the university applied to the high court for the recovery of around R7-million believed to have been embezzled by Mokadi. This matter is still proceeding.
However, last week the criminal charges against Mokadi were thrown out of court at the Vanderbijlpark Magistrate’s Court because of lack of evidence. Mokadi says this presents an opportunity to challenge VUT’s decision to sack him.
”Definitely, there is no doubt about my reinstatement — all these battles that I have been engaged in are to do with my reinstatement. I could not be vindicated and exonerated just for the fun of it — what they [VUT] say does not bother me — they got something that is neither here nor there,” said Mokadi.
Mokadi told the Mail & Guardian that he has submitted an urgent review application to the high court ”to set aside the kangaroo court outcome that got me expelled and rule it null and void”.
He said evidence used to expel him as vice-chancellor has no standing in the law and that the investigation was done ”surreptitiously and clandestinely”, with people canvassed to say bad things about him.
Mokadi said ”short-sighted, jealous and envious” university officials who colluded with the police were behind his dismissal. ”Change is very painful and it is very easy for people — to be jealous and envious. During my time the university did very well — if you do comparisons with what is happening now.”
Last week the VUT council said it did not wish to comment on the efficiency or the inefficiency of the state’s presentation of its case against Mokadi. The university indicated, however, that the outcome of the criminal case does not alter Mokadi’s status as a dismissed employee. Professor Irene Moutlana was appointed vice-chancellor of VUT in 2007.
In 2006 a Council on Higher Education audit report found that graduation rates at VUT had fluctuated between 10% and 14% over the previous decade — well below the national target of 25%. The audit was conducted a year after Mokadi was sent on compulsory leave before his dismissal.
At the time the M&G reported: ”The commission remarked then that Mokadi ‘seems to feel the need to liken himself to Christ’.” After a previous suspension in 1997, Mokadi said that students and staff supporters ”stripped garments from their backs and laid them on the ground for me to walk on … images of Christ on his triumphant entry to Jerusalem [flashed] through my mind”.
According to VUT, since Mokadi’s dismissal the university has seen a massive increase in graduate rates, from around 12% during Mokadi’s time in office to 16,6% at the end of 2007.