A BULWARK AGAINST CORRUPTION

YEARS after she was booted from the SAA board as chairperson, Dudu Myeni’s tenure will haunt her for life.

On Monday, the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) dismissed her application to appeal against the North Gauteng High Court which last year declared her a delinquent director. This after the high court had, in December 2020, dismissed her application for leave to appeal against its judgment.

In a terse ruling, the SCA ruled: “The application for leave to appeal is dismissed with costs on the grounds that there is no reasonable prospect of success in an appeal, and there is no other compelling reason why an appeal should be heard.”

The application to declare her a delinquent director was brought by the Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (Outa) and the SAA Pilots’ Association.

After numerous delays, which saw Myeni change legal counsel, the case got under way and in May Judge Ronel Tolmay found that the former SAA chair had been dishonest, reckless and grossly negligent in her conduct while in the position.

Tolmay in her judgment further stated that the national carrier had been so profoundly mismanaged that its debts posed one of the biggest threats to South Africa’s economy.

The SCA's ruling means that Myeni is immediately barred from being seated on any board – for life – and has to step down from her positions on the boards of the Jacob Zuma Foundation and Centlec, a state-owned company that supplies electricity to municipalities in KwaZulu-Natal.

While Myeni's tenure at SAA was certainly not the genesis of the mismanagement and looting, she was there between 2012 and 2017 when it went into overdrive. Instead of being accountable, Myeni has obfuscated and spun conspiracy theories while pointing fingers elsewhere.

But this should be a lesson for anyone, particularly those sitting on the boards of state-owned companies, that they will be held to account and no amount of political manoeuvring will shield them.

The courts have proved once again to be a bulwark against corruption and looting, particularly when elected officials refuse to act against powerful actors who assume they are protected.