Eastern Cape Judge President Selby Mbenenge. (Nelius Rademan/ Foto24/Gallo Images)
The secretary who has accused Eastern Cape judge president Selby Mbenenge of sexual harassment told the tribunal hearing her complaint that one of her colleagues told her he had a reputation for such behaviour.
Andiswa Mengo testified that she took a screenshot of a picture Mbenenge sent her via WhatsApp of his penis and forwarded it to a colleague “for safekeeping”.
She had done so because she felt the need to confide in someone, but also to preserve evidence of what was transpiring, because Mbenenge had taken to deleting the many compromising messages that he sent to her.
“It was now the time when he was now deleting everything,” said Mengo, a 37-year-old single mother who was at the time working for another judge in the division and who has said she feared she could lose her job if she angered the judge president.
“It was also to inform that person that there is something befalling me.”
Mengo said she sent the image in question to two colleagues, one of whom has since died. The second person she sent it to, a woman named Brenda, responded by asking whether the image had been sent by Mbenenge.
“She then asked: ‘Who sent this to you? Is it Mbenenge?’ She mentioned the respondent’s surname,” Mengo testified through an isiXhosa translator.
“She then finished off by saying: ‘He is the person that we know who sends these to people.’”
Mengo said she responded to the remark with laughing emojis, before adding that men who engaged in such conduct seemingly did not care that they were married or that it could damage their careers.
For six days, the tribunal, headed by retired Gauteng judge president Bernard Ngoepe, has been hearing evidence from Mengo about WhatsApp exchanges between June and November 2021 in which Mbenenge allegedly repeatedly sent her pornographic images, as well images of his genitalia and pressed her to have sex with him.
The record showed that Mengo repeatedly rejected the judge president’s advances but that there were also occasions where she indulged his tone and reciprocated with sexual innuendo.
She said she did so because she hoped he would read between the lines to sense her anger and sarcasm but also because she was exasperated that when she said “no”, he simply continued to hound her.
Therefore, she thought that if she replied in a way that “pleased” him, he would leave her in peace. But this too had no effect as the improper demands continued.
Mengo testified on Monday that she finally confided in Eastern Cape judge Mandela Makaula in November that year after Mbenenge called her into his office, masturbated in front of her and asked her to perform oral sex on him.
“He asked me if I did not want to suck it,” she testified in isiXhosa.
Mengo said she was shocked and left the judge’s chambers without saying a word. She returned to her own office and went home soon after.
Asked by evidence leader Salome Scheepers whether she had told anybody what had happened, she replied: “I was scared that no one would believe me if I were to convey that to anyone.”
Mengo said she did eventually, after a few days and in considerable distress, tell Makaula what had transpired and that she was traumatised by the thought of what could have happened, if she had not swiftly left the respondent’s chambers.
“I finished by saying, if he had got hold of me or grabbed me, how was I going to get loose?”
Makaula urged her to inform the director of court operations, who asked her how she would like to see the matter handled. In response, Mengo requested a round-table with a number of judges in the division, as well as the respondent.
She had proposed that this panel include, among others, Makaula and two female judges from the Eastern Cape, and hoped that they would understand what she had endured from Mbenenge and intervene.
The round-table meeting was never convened. Mengo said she heard that this was because Mbenenge, when informed of her complaint, countered that she was lying.
She responded by taking screenshots of some of their exchanges, including one showing an explicit image, and posted it on her Whatsapp notice.
“I did not remove his name or crop it,” she added, stressing that Mbenenge was identifiable as the sender.
“No one was going to believe me. It was my way of crying out and saying, ‘Here is proof.’”
Mengo said after this, she received a raft of messages from colleagues in the division. Among those who reached out to her was judge Lindiwe Rusi. However, their interaction became fraught after Rusi told Mengo that there was a rumour that she had said Rusi had offered her money to retract her allegations.
She finally filed a formal complaint in December 2022 after she moved to the office of the chief justice in Midrand. She said there she spoke to Advocate Marelize Potgieter, currently the acting secretary general of the Office of the Chief Justice, who helped her to bring a formal complaint.
She told the tribunal that Potgieter had intimated that other women had also complained about Mbenenge’s conduct.
He is the first judge in South Africa to risk impeachment for sexual misconduct.
Mbenenge has denied sending Mengo sexually explicit material and qualified their exchanges as “playful” and consensual.