listed on website for deadbeats
South Africa’s leading black `wine ambassador’ is listed on an American `Deadbeat Hall of Shame’ Internet site for not paying child support. Cliff Matheson and Justin Arenstein report
He is world renowned as South Africa’s leading black “wine ambassador”, but Jabulani Ntshangase has a shady secret. He is featured in an American “Deadbeat Hall of Shame”, for allegedly failing to pay child maintenance to his New York-based dependents over the past four years.
Ntshangase, who knows a wine with good legs from one with a heady bouquet or an acidic nose, allegedly owes more than $26E000 (about R156E000) in child support.
Records at New York City’s child support enforcement agency indicate that he made his last payment on May 17 1995. The agency has given up trying to trace Ntshangase but has posted his photograph and details on its public “deadbeat” web-site, warning that he is “seriously delinquent”.
Ntshangase confirmed on Wednesday that he was aware of the listing but declined to comment on an issue he described as an “intensely private family matter”. Uncertain how he had landed up in arrears, Ntshangase said that he is still legally and happily married to his wife and regularly visits her and their two daughters in New York.
“I go there at least four times per year and have, in fact, just returned from Thanksgiving celebrations. I have been alerted to the issue and am investigating,” he said. “The issue is not at the top of my priorities right at the moment. My business is, quite frankly, far more important.”
Ntshangase has made a business of his outspoken support for black empowerment in the traditionally white wine industry. He currently writes a weekly column on wine issues for the Cape Times and actively mentors black viticulture students at Stellenbosch University. He also helps financially disadvantaged black students find corporate patrons.
Ntshangase developed his nose for wine while living in exile in the United States, where he fled after the 1976 student uprising in Soweto. He ended up working in a wine store after studying for a business degree at New York’s Baruch College and was enticed into the heady world of wine by the “intriguing” conversations between customers and the store’s owner.
“They all kept talking about the stuff being full-bodied or having good legs. It just sounded like something I had to get into,” said Ntshangase. He later moved to a wine store in Connecticut, where he became manager and buyer.
When South Africa opened up after the release of Nelson Mandela, he imported the first South African wines into the US. Ntshangase finally decided to return home in 1995, where he became the official “wine ambassador” for Spier Wine Estate.
“I now devote all my time to helping blacks break into what is still a lily- white industry. There are thousands of blacks working on wine farms but they are almost all manual labourers,” said Ntshangase. “My fight to get blacks into wine growing and into management is far more important than some American hall of shame.”
Ntshangase has, however, retained a New York attorney to probe the listing and get his affairs in order. The attorney, Ed Wilford, was continually unavailable for comment this week. – African Eye News Service
@Unitra buckles under two sets of staff
Swapna Prabhakaran
Private contractors and full-time staff at the University of Transkei (Unitra) are mired in an ongoing battle for wages, after a year of turbulent management left the university saddled with two sets of employees to perform basic technical services.
A legal battle looms as the “expensive mistake” by Unitra’s management has meant local companies will have to forfeit their contracts with the university.
More than 530 non-academic staff were retrenched late last year by the university principal, Alfred Moleah, as a result of severe budget constraints.
In their place, private contractors were hired to perform on-campus services, including catering, maintenance and security.
Now the retrenched staff have been re- employed after complaints about the retrenchment process from the National Education, Health and Allied Workers Union (Nehawu) led to an investigation. A report by an independent assessor, Louis Skweyiya, recommended that the retrenched workers be taken on board again, as the decision to retrench had not been officially ratified by Unitra’s council.
By this time, however, the private contractors had already taken over the tasks of the returning staffers. Sources at the university say full-scale intimidation is now going on, as contract workers are being chased off campus and told their services are no longer required.
Moleah maintains that the retrenchments were made with good cause as the university is in dire financial straits. “We found ourselves in a situation where 83% of the university’s subsidy goes to salaries. That is unsustainable and will lead to financial ruin,” Moleah said.
However, Nehawu’s position is that the way in which the retrenchments were carried out was not sensitive to the university’s needs, nor to the workers. Moleah has now been forced into taking leave from the university until his contract expires in June. Acting principal Duma Malaza has stepped into Moleah’s shoes in his absence. Malaza says Unitra is now feeling the financial burden of an “expensive mistake” made by Moleah.
“Our problem arises from the former principal, who retrenched workers without council’s consent, and engaged private workers without proper procedure.”
Malaza believes Moleah made the decision to hire private contractors with spite. “[Moleah] knew that council had reinstated the [retrenched] workers, and yet he went ahead and hired contract workers. It was done wilfully and with a full awareness of the consequences,” he said.
Over the past two weeks, Malaza has been “working out terms of disengagement” with several of the contracted companies, paying out negotiated settlement fees to dissolve the contracts. However, some of the companies are prepared to take the university to court to defend their contracts – an expensive venture for an already beleaguered institution.
Meanwhile, reports of intimidation continue. Director of technical services Norman Bunn said he was on his annual leave last month. He discovered that in his absence “the union [Nehawu] had taken over, without following procedures”.
Bunn said, “Contractors who were appointed are now being intimidated. There has been physical intimidation, people have broken into their offices, they have been refused entry on to campus. I have been threatened too. They said they would kill me. There is a state of lawlessness on campus.”
He said the private company, Crime Beat, which had been hired to oversee security, was threatened at the gates by armed men. The president of the student representative council, Lwazi Lushaba, said the meeting at the gates was not confrontational.
“It has been skewed into appearing as harassment,” he said. “What happened was the security company was told by university employees they would have to leave. It was explained to them exactly why it was important they would have to leave, we wanted to make sure they understood,” Lushaba said.
Malaza said this week he “wouldn’t be surprised if a little intimidation was going on, given the circumstances”.