Apleni’s suspension set aside by court
VINDICATED: ‘NOW I JUST WANT TO GO BACK TO WORK’
The High Court in Pretoria yesterday set aside the ‘cautionary suspension’ of the home affairs director-general.
Former minister ‘tried to use my absence to settle litigation worth millions’.
There was loud applause in the High Court in Pretoria yesterday after the court set aside the “cautionary suspension” of home affairs home director-general Mkhuseli Apleni.
Smiling broadly, Apleni hugged supporters and shook hands with his legal team.
Judge Hans Fabricius ruled that former home affairs minister Hlengiwe Mkhize lacked the authority to suspend Apleni and declared that his suspension was unconstitutional and of no force and effect.
He rejected the minister’s reliance on a 1999 letter by former President Thabo Mbeki to prove that he had delegated his powers to the ministers, saying there was no evidence that Mbeki had signed such a delegation or that it was signed by a Cabinet member as envisaged by the Public Service Act. The minister, therefore, had no lawful authority to suspend the director-general.
Apleni said the verdict vindicated his point that it was only the president who could suspend him, especially when he was accused of being a director-general for a long time, but not understanding the prescripts of the law.
He said it pained him that people were abusing their power in this country “in a manner that could not be believed” and that they could not find ways to resolve matters and understand things, but had to come to court.
“I’ve been at home now for two months for something that should have been resolved from day one,” he said. “Now I just want to go back and serve the people whom I’m committed to serve.
“... I have not yet talked about this matter to the new minister, Ayanda Dlodlo, but it has nothing to do with the new minister. The suspension has been set aside, I’m going back to the office,” he said.
Apleni has accused Mkhize of acting irrationally and suspending him on trumped-up charges so that she could use his absence to settle litigation against the department involving millions of rands which ought not to be settled.
This included litigation by Fireblade, a company owned by the Oppenheimer family, to be allowed to operate a “very, very important persons centre” at OR Tambo International Airport, a R300 million claim by the liquidators of Double Ring Trading 222 and a R1 million dispute with Atlantis Corporate Travel, which involved the former minister’s son, Sizwe.
Mkhize accused Apleni of being “delusional” and paranoid and deliberately undermining her authority. –