Unisa did conclude the sale of its stately mansion Cloghereen last year for R6-million, it did then pay R1,7-million to get out of the sale after Dr Barney Pityana arrived as vice-chancellor in November, and the palatial residence — in which he will live — is to undergo extensive and expensive renovations.
These are among the central allegations reported in the Mail & Guardian last week that Pityana’s press conference on Tuesday, which he called to rebut the story, served to confirm. He also launched an all-out personal attack on M&G education reporter David Macfarlane, who wrote the story.
”Is David Macfarlane here?” Pityana asked as he kicked off Tuesday’s proceedings. When the reporter’s presence was confirmed, he said, ”The purpose of this media meeting today is to expose him for the fraud that he is.” A ”campaign” and ”conspiracy” against Unisa and himself were under way, Pityana said, and ”the campaign is orchestrated by David Macfarlane personally and he uses his position as a journalist to advance his personal agenda”.
Macfarlane and the M&G ”are part of a conspiracy together with some nameless and faceless individuals” within Unisa, Pityana alleged. ”There is in this a not-so-veiled racist purpose … Macfarlane is like the security police of the past.”
On Cloghereen itself, Pityana said that at the beginning of the year, ”an investigation” found that ”the property had not been sold on the most favourable terms, and that it would be hard if not impossible to find a comparable replacement at the price Cloghereen was sold for … Our view on this matter is that both council and management of the University of South Africa acted wisely and responsibly.”
Pityana also confirmed that his offices are being refurbished. ”Not only do we have rather drab office suites for senior executives, no improvements had been done in the last 20 years.” The M&G reported estimates that this refurbishment would cost R1,5-million. ”We … invited estimates from various interior decorators,” Pityana said. ”That process is not complete.”
He denied that he and council chairperson McCaps Motimele flew first class on a recent fund-raising trip to the United States. He also confirmed that, as the M&G reported, Unisa will hold a graduation ceremony in Mauritius in June. The M&G reported suggestions that much of the Unisa management and council would attend. Pityana said ”staff, executive management, the chancellor and a member of council [will] attend — that is, all the people necessary for a graduation ceremony”. He denied that this will be ”an extravagant trip initiated by the principal [Pityana]”.
Pityana’s and Motimele’s air travel to New York and the trip to Mauritius formed part of 25 detailed questions the M&G sent to Pityana in writing last week. Twenty were faxed to him on Tuesday, and another five e-mailed on Wednesday. The M&G reported that Pityana ”declined to answer” these questions.
”This is a lie,” Pityana said at his Tuesday press conference. Acknowledging his receipt of the questions, Pityana said, ”We wrote back to [Macfarlane] and asked him for some further explanations, background as well as an idea as to which other institutions he had covered. We indicated that we would consider our reply once we receive[d] his response. There was no reply.”
This was the first the M&G had heard of the communication to which Pityana referred. Inquiries this week revealed that Unisa intended to fax on Friday last week the letter Pityana described. That would have been well after the deadline the M&G had requested and about 14 hours after the M&G had gone to print.
But Unisa head of media affairs Doreen Gough could not confirm that the fax had been sent at all. ”I’m not sure you would have received it,” she told the M&G this week. It was meant to have been sent ”by our secretary on Friday afternoon”.
The M&G‘s report also referred to huge legal expenses Unisa is incurring in a raft of cases all involving the controversial council. ”We need to state for the record,” Pityana said at his press conference, ”that where anyone, including staff [,] challenges the decisions of council in court, and if the university judges that it has a valid defence, the university will take steps to defend.”
Pityana’s statement made no reference to controversies over Unisa’s payments to some council members, which the M&G‘s report also described. The auditor general last year found these payments to be unjustified: its report recommended specific amounts that should be recovered from various councillors.
Accusing Macfarlane and the M&G of being part of a campaign ”to derail the progress towards transformation, divert attention and resources from our vision and to halt the realisation of goals articulated by the government for higher education”, Pityana announced that Unisa had instructed attorneys to ”institute immediate action for libel and defamation against David Macfarlane personally, the Mail & Guardian and any other newspapers that publish defamatory material”.
At the time of going to press, the M&G had received no summons or other legal papers from Pityana or Unisa.