UCT law staff want truth to be told
Faculty angry that dean’s mistakes covered up — claim
● Academics in the law faculty say the University of Cape Town (UCT) has whitewashed the reign of former dean Professor Penny Andrews by covering up bullying, financial mismanagement and patronage.
And they are furious that an executive report on an internal investigation blamed the entire faculty for a temporary suspension of accreditation for UCT’s law degree when Andrews was solely responsible.
A vote this week also showed that a strong majority of faculty academics wanted inaccuracies in the executive report to be corrected.
When contacted by the Sunday Times after the report was leaked, some academics said they wanted to “set the record straight” so that “further damage isn’t done elsewhere”.
Andrews was appointed in 2016 after years abroad and was the faculty’s first black dean. When damning financial statements were leaked earlier this year, she said she was being “vilified” on racial grounds.
But Khomotso Moshikaro, an academic in the department of private law, said Andrews used “untransformed” as a “placeholder to silence anybody who disagreed with her” when actually “transformation does not entail lower standards from people of colour”.
He said: “Black academics and leaders are entitled to, and should be held to, the same standards of accountability, rigour and competence.
“An institution with transformation issues can also end up with a black leader or senior who seriously fails to discharge their duties. The two things can be true at the same time.”
This week, when asked about the allegations, Andrews reiterated her stance that they were all “malicious and untrue” and were part of a “smear campaign” that emerged “after [her] decision to leave UCT”.
The university executive said in May that she would step down as dean in December but would be using her “accumulated study and research leave” to take up other interests from August 1.
Andrews is moving back to New York this month after a stint as an acting judge in the Gauteng high court.
Professor Rashida Manjoo, a former UN special rapporteur on violence against women, said written submissions had been sent to the executive about the “hostile work environment and bullying culture” under Andrews, but that on her departure, the executive “put out a glowing statement. That’s why the narrative out there is still so distorted.”
Andrews’s departure came after allegations of financial mismanagement were added to complaints patronage system.
Moshikaro and other staff were chastised when they suspected wrongdoing and asked to see faculty financial statements. After a standoff, a redacted version was released and leaked on Twitter. It revealed massive overspending.
Around R285,000 was budgeted for travel but R611,000 was spent — much of it on trips by Andrews. Allowances for staff, some of them promoted by Andrews, were overspent by around R950,000. And while R7,000 was budgeted for functions, R80,000 was spent. The inquiry report said that Andrews had erred because she wasn’t “familiar” with the rules.
The academics are also angry that the report blamed the entire faculty for how it nearly lost its law degree accreditation. Andrews refused to let anyone give input on an improvement plan requested by the Council for Higher Education or show it to anyone before submission, and submitted a brief of bullying and
adocument that was found to be deficient. The recent inquiry was made aware of these facts, yet the report says a “collective responsibility” is behind this failure.
Cathleen Powell, an associate professor in the department of public law, said: “The university is attempting to carry on as if nothing happened. An acknowledgement of what happened would help to heal personal damage.”
UCT spokesperson Elijah Moholola told the Sunday Times: “There is a strong will to move on from this phase in the life of the faculty rather than to continue allocating responsibility to individuals for what has occurred in the past.”
He acknowledged the issues raised in response to the report and said its “shortcomings” were being addressed.
Manjoo said the report’s biggest shortcomings were its “failure to acknowledge the bullying that happened, and also the notion that we should all take responsibility for the accreditation debacle”.