Legal fees add nearly R40m more to the total bill for province department
The Mpumalanga department of agriculture, rural development, land and environmental affairs has come under fire for spending more than R20 million paying two former employees for unfair dismissal.
This information is contained in the department’s portfolio committee’s recently released report.
Mpumalanga department employees dismissed unfairly
According to the report, the Labour Court ordered the department to pay R21 million to the two senior officials as their dismissal was found to be both procedurally and substantively unfair.
“The court ordered the department to pay retrospective compensation from the date of dismissal (2009 to 2024) and reinstate the employees,” the report says.
The department told the committee that the payments would not affect service delivery because they were drawn from the compensation of employees’ allocation.
ALSO READ: Municipality granted time to challenge R700k employee payout order
According to the document, the department incurred more than R30 million in legal fees associated with the two employees.
“In some circumstances, the department incurred no cost orders as the court did not make an order against the department. The department paid R1 554 000 between October 2024 and March this year, bringing the total amount paid during the 2024-2025 financial year to R39 516 536,” the document reads.
Factors that could lead to wrongful dismissals
Labour analyst Bukani Mngoma said there were many things that could have contributed to the situation that the department finds itself in. He said it might happen that they were given bad legal advice.
“Sometimes dismissals are wrong and management may know, but they pursue it because it may serve a political consideration, or they want to get rid of an employee who knows too much, or is a stumbling block to doing a corrupt act.
ALSO READ: Legal Practice Council administrator accused of corruption loses Labour Court bid
“It is rare that such dismissals are a result of sheer incompetence, as there are too many people involved before an employee is finally dismissed.
“There is no way that in this chain of involvement no-one is picking up that the dismissal will cost the entity heavily,” said Mngoma.
Public sector dismissals generally costly
Mngoma said dismissals in the public sector were generally costly because of the high salaries employees get compared to those in the private sector. He said the seniority of the employee also made the dismissals even more costly.
He added that the other factor was that it takes time before the matter can be finally decided, particularly if the employee was reinstated, because they may need to be paid from the date of dismissal.
“So, the longer the matter has taken, the more expensive reinstatement becomes. I say this because if the employee wins the case but is only compensated, there is a legal capping of 12 months’ payment of compensation, irrespective of the period the matter dragged on.
“What I have also noticed is that investigations in the public sector take too long, as they want to get absolute proof as if the matter is in a criminal court.”
Tersia Marshall, a DA member in the provincial legislature, has called on the department of public service and administration to consider placing a cap on the number of times it takes government departments to resolve cases of suspended or fired public service employees.
Department spokesperson Zanele Shabangu did not respond to questions sent to her on Wednesday.
