Disciplinary hearing for councillors

Action against ANC members who refused polygraph tests

ANC councillors who failed polygraph tests to find out who voted against the party in a mayoral election last June will walk away scot-free.

However, 11 King Sabata Dalindyebo (KSD) municipality councillors who refused to undergo the tests now face a disciplinary hearing.

This was announced by ANC provincial secretary Oscar Mabuyane yesterday.

Among the 11 are three KSD mayoral committee members and council speaker Funeka Dondashe.

Mabuyane said the party decided only the 11 would be charged as the polygraph tests were not necessarily accurate.

“It’s not that once you fail, you are guilty as charged,” he said.

All 45 KSD ANC councillors were instructed to avail themselves to the “truth verification programme” on June 30 last year after the party almost lost to the UDM in mayoral elections.

This was after nine ANC councillors voted with the opposition.

KSD mayor Nonkoliso Ngqongwa won the race by a narrow margin after securing 35 votes against the UDM’S Wandile Tsipa, who picked up 33 votes.

The UDM has only 18 representatives in the council, while the DA and COPE have two each and the Independent Democrats and Icasa have one each, leaving at least nine votes which would have had to have come from ANC members.

A copy of the truth verification report seen by the Daily Dispatch confirmed forensic investigator Leon Nel was hired to interview all the ANC’S 45 councillors.

Of the 45, 11 refused to be tested, six failed and the results of two were inconclusive.

Professor Shadrack Gutto of Unisa’s Centre for African Renaissance Studies, a constitutional expert, earlier told the Daily Dispatch the country’s Constitution did not make provision for the use of lie detector tests.

Gutto said if the lie detector tests were challenged, the matter stood a good chance of landing before the Constitutional Court.

“They [ANC] can take them to a disciplinary hearing, but they can’t force them to take lie detector tests.

“That will be unconstitutional,” said Gutto.

Mabuyane said the intention was not to use the polygraph test to guide political decisions as the ANC.

“But because of the environment of factionalism in that area [O R Tambo and KSD regions], we wanted an independent process that would guide us. It’s a process everybody knows cannot give you 100% accurate results.

“We were not going to say if you [failed] this, it’s cast in stone – you are guilty.

“We had already received information and had clear evidence of who did what because some confessed they indeed voted for the UDM even though they were ANC deployees and members of the party.

“Our intention was never to deal with individuals,” said Mabuyane.

The Dispatch reported last week that Chief Bhovulengwe Mtirara, Kwanele Mdikane and Nompumelelo Nyangani – who were axed as mayoral committee members last month amid claims they defied the party – were reinstated last Friday.