Bathabile Dlamini (Oupa Nkosi)
Talks of dissolving the ANC Women’s League and instead installing a task team could gain momentum following the guilty verdict against its president Bathabile Dlamini on Wednesday.
The league has been teetering on the brink of collapse as many of its provinces fail to grow their base. The league has also been tainted by financial scandals that have resulted in the suspension of its North West provincial leaders for alleged fraud and corruption after R2-million went missing.
The Mail & Guardian recently reported that the league’s national structure had also reported a missing R10-million, while the organisation was struggling to raise funds for its conference.
Magistrate Betty Khumalo at the Johannesburg magistrate’s court found that the former minister of social development had committed perjury while being cross-examined in the 2018 inquiry relating to the South African Social Security Agency (Sassa) grants debacle. The state has argued for jail time or a substantial fine. Sentencing will take place on 1 April.
Dlamini, who has ruled with an iron fist, will be expected to step aside from her position as president as well as from the ANC’s national executive committee (NEC) following the judgment, in accordance with the ANC’s step-aside resolution.
Although the ANC has implemented its step-aside resolution in almost all its structures, Dlamini has slipped through the cracks with the help of those loyal to her in the league’s NEC.
The league narrowly escaped being disbanded during an ANC national working committee (NWC) meeting on 28 February. Instead, the NWC proposed that the league prepare a report of its road map to a long-awaited conference. The league last went to conference in 2015.
The disbandment of the league in order to install a national task team was fiercely debated during the NWC meeting, where Dlamini’s camp trashed the proposal, claiming that it was fuelled by patriarchy.
During that meeting, the women’s league secretary general Meokgo Matuba made it clear that there were challenges in almost all of its provinces.
“There is no organisation in Northern Cape, we need to pull out and find comrades there. In Mpumalanga, there [aren’t] structures in good standing; we don’t even have structures that are acting. In KwaZulu-Natal we have extended their mandate and the secretary continues to work,” Matuba said.
Meanwhile, those who are in Dlamini’s camp say there is a loophole in the step-aside guidelines. They say that they may exploit the resolution’s amended guidelines, which only call for those charged with corruption to step aside or face suspension.
Matuba said the league noted the ruling against its president adding that the structure was currently studying the ruling. “We are in no position to communicate anything with regards to the matter until further notice,” she said.
In her judgment, Khumalo found that the state had adequately proven beyond reasonable doubt that the former minister lied. “The accused is accordingly found guilty as charged in respect of the main charge of perjury,” Khumalo said.
Dlamini had previously pleaded not guilty to the charge and denied giving false information to the inquiry, adding that if she did lie, it was unintentional.
Earlier this year, Dlamini’s attorney, Tshepiso Mphahlane, asked the court to find that his client did not intentionally lie during her testimony.
“If she made a false statement [then] she did not know that it was false because it is possible and it does happen,” he said.
Mphahlane further explained: “A witness might come before you and say so-and-so was driving a blue vehicle that was involved in the accident, [but] it turns out the vehicle was red. The person is charged with perjury and it turns out the person is colourblind.”
However, advocate Jacob Serepo, on behalf of the state, maintained that Dlamini lied under oath and gave false evidence at the inquiry.
Serepo also argued that there was nothing political about the prosecution of Dlamini, as had been alleged.
“It’s solely based on the testimony of the accused during the inquiry. The record of the transcripts is testimony to that,” Serepo said.
Serepo also brought former Sassa chief executive Thokozani Magwaza to the stand as the state’s witness. He was the only person who brought forth evidence against the former minister.
During his testimony, Magwaza told the court he was appointed as acting director general in March 2015 and chief executive in 2016. However, he left after receiving death threats.
“It was a mutual agreement between me and the minister (Dlamini) that I leave Sassa because things were no longer tenable for me,” he said.
“I approached her (Dlamini) and told her that I can’t die for grants,” Magwaza said.
He also told the court that Dlamini often interfered with the internal operations of the agency.
Dlamini opted not to testify.
In her judgment, magistrate Khumalo further said: “It is this court’s view that the defence is merely grasping at straws here and playing with semantics. It is therefore this court’s view that the argument has no merit because all the evidence points to the minister having at least two to three meetings with the work streams, which would mean meetings with or of the work streams.
“I am therefore satisfied that the state has beyond reasonable doubt proved a case against the accused on the main count. The accused is accordingly found guilty of the charge in respect of the main charge of perjury.”
Dlamini was summoned in August 2021 by the director of public prosecutions in Gauteng to appear before the courts after her 2018 inquiry.
The inquiry, which was chaired by Judge Bernard Ngoepe, was instituted by the constitutional court after it had rebuked Dlamini for the repeated extension of the unlawful contract between the Sassa and its former grants distributor, Cash Paymaster Services.
In his findings, Ngoepe said that Dlamini was an evasive and inconsistent witness.
He also said she contradicted her own evidence that she had not set up parallel structures in Sassa that reported directly to her, adding that she failed to disclose the extent of her involvement in the social grants debacle.
Dlamini was ordered by the apex court to pay a personal cost order of around R650 000 for her role in the social grants crisis.
The case stems from an application brought forward by the Black Sash Trust and Freedom Under Law in an attempt to hold Dlamini accountable for her role in the 2017 grant crisis.
The debacle dates back to March 2017, where scores of South Africans were worried whether they would get their social grants as the department did not finalise a new contract with a new agency to disburse the grants.
At her appearance, Dlamini was supported by suspended ANC secretary general Ace Magashule, Supra Mahumapelo, Carl Niehaus and Tony Yengeni.
Dlamini’s lawyer asked that she remain on warning after the judge said she should be taken to the cells.
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