THE ANC will appoint an advocate from the Johannesburg Bar to hear the former uMkhonto weSizwe Military Veterans Association (MKMVA) spokesperson, Carl Niehaus’s, appeal of his dismissal from employment by the governing party.
On Tuesday, ANC deputy secretary-general Jessie Duarte informed Niehaus that during the appeal, he would be allowed to be represented by a fellow employee who was in good standing with the ANC.
”For your information, the ANC is in the process of appointing a member of the Johannesburg Bar to consider your appeal against your dismissal from employment and you will be advised in due course of the date and venue of the appeal hearing,” reads Duarte’s letter.
The ANC fired Niehaus earlier this month. He was suspended in July, following remarks he made outside former president Jacob Zuma’s Nkandla homestead after the Constitutional Court ordered the former president’s arrest.
Duarte told Niehaus the ANC’s national disciplinary committee of appeal (NDCA), chaired by its national executive committee member, Nomvula Mokonyane, notified him in August that it lacked jurisdiction and authority to consider and set aside his suspension.
”Without intending to interfere in the decision-making process of the NDCA, I can advise you that it is expressly stated in the ANC constitution that a temporary suspension is valid for 30 days or until set aside by the NDCA, whichever is the shorter period,” she said.
Duarte said the ANC constitution also set out, specifically in rule 25.65, that a temporary suspension would lapse if a notice of a charge was not delivered to a member within 30 days from the date of its commencement.
“I trust that this explanation serves to inform you of your current status as an ANC member,“ she said.
Niehaus has described his axing from his job at Luthuli House as amounting to a summary dismissal, draconian and unreasonable.
”It is contrary to all the laws of natural justice. It is my contention that this is constructive dismissal,” he said the day he was fired.
Last night, Niehaus took to Twitter and told his followers that he had received a letter from Duarte stating that his temporary suspension of his ANC membership had lapsed and that he was again a member of the party in good standing.
Political Bureau