An investigation by the Public Protector into a payment of more than R1.1 million made by Newcastle Local Municipality towards the legal costs of a company owned by former ActionSA chief whip Faizel Cassim has been concluded.

The subsequent report issued by Advocate Kholeka Gcaleka clears the municipality of improper conduct, maladministration and abuse of power in respect of the payments made to Cassim’s company, Newcastle Industrial Launders (NIL), by Newcastle Municipality from April 2023 to June 2023, totalling R1,137,663.36.

In an interview with the Northern Natal News last week, Cassim had this to say to anyone in the community who doubted him.

“I told you so!”

Cassim stated that he now expects a retraction… and an apology from those who accused him of any wrongdoing.

How it all started

The saga begins in August 2021 in the run-up to the local government elections that took place in November of that year.

This was the first time that ActionSA contested a local government election and Cassim was touted as the party’s mayoral candidate in Newcastle by its president, Herman Mashaba, and national chairperson, Michael Beaumont.

Soon after Cassim was publicly endorsed by ActionSA’s leadership for the mayoral position, then ANC mayor of Newcastle, Dr Nthuthuko Mahlaba, accused Cassim in an interview that aired on national television of deliberately channelling chemical pollutants from his laundromat and screen printing business into the Amcor Dam.

Whatever contaminant was polluting the dam at the time had caused the death of aquatic life, as well as two cows drinking from the Ncandu River.

Cassim maintained that he was not responsible for the contamination of the dam or the river.

He was adamant that the accusations made by Mahlaba stemmed from a political vendetta meant to ruin his reputation, destroy his business and teach him a lesson.

In response to Mahlaba’s televised interview, Cassim distributed a video of foaming at the Amcor Dam, which resulted from the contamination, ‘posing as the whistle-blower exposing the inadequacies of the municipality in order to gain political traction ahead of the election’, according to an official press statement released by Newcastle Municipality.

A team from the municipality took water samples at four key points, including effluent running from Cassim’s factory down the street into a storm-water channel, water running from the storm-water channel into the Amcor Dam, a sample of the foaming discoloured water at the base of the Dam’s waterfall, and at the point where two cows were drinking before they died.

“Anyone who knows me knows that I am a fair person. If I am guilty, then I must pay the price, but if I am not, I want my name cleared. I urge them to do their job without any interference,” said Cassim at the time.

Cassim, himself arranged to have water samples tested for fear that the municipality would tamper with the samples it took to falsely implicate him.

“I made contact with an independent service provider from Durban, who does water testing, and paid him to come to Newcastle to do sample testing to ensure that it is done in the proper manner. “

He arrived with his special bottles and zip lock gadgets and, to be fair, I called SAPS and requested for a police officer to be present to witness that the samples were not tampered with in any way,” Cassim explained.

“I just want it to be fair. If I am at fault, I will accept it.”

Municipal officials denied that the investigation was politically motivated, saying the incident that triggered the investigation was a report from a farmer that two of his cows had died after drinking water from the river.

The farmer informed the municipality that he observed a bluish-black discolouration and foaming in the water the cows were drinking.

On October 6, 2021, Cassim was ordered by the Pietermaritzburg High Court to temporarily halt operations and he was interdicted from disposing any effluent into the storm-water drainage system.

The municipality even went so far as to remove the water meter and connection from Cassim’s business property.

The effect this had on Cassim’s livelihood was devastating. According to Cassim, due to the reputational damage his company suffered, he was never able to resume business operations, and NIL (a business he had hoped to pass on to his children as his legacy) remains closed to this day.

Cassim told the Northern Natal News he doesn’t believe the cows ever existed, as no post-mortem results were ever submitted to High Court.

Conflicting results follow water analyses In October 2021, Newcastle Municipality publicly released the analysis report of the water samples it took.

“It has been ascertained that the chemicals used to pollute Newcastle’s water sources are both hazardous and deadly for marine life. Samples of the chemicals were collected and sent to a SANAS-accredited laboratory for analyses. “The sample chemicals were found from the industrial laundry channel, leading to the storm water and eventually pumped out to the Amcor Dam,” stated the municipality.

The following week, ActionSA held a press conference in Newcastle to present the findings of an independent, scientific investigation into the claims made by the municipality, accusing the municipality of ‘…redirecting attention away from its appalling service delivery record’.

According to ActionSA, independent test results indicated that, “There is no way that the contamination of the Ncandu River or the Amcor Dam can be traced back to the (Cassim’s) laundry.

“The executive summary of the test results indicated that the entire water system around Newcastle is heavily contaminated and it is contaminated from above the laundromat to below the laundromat, and by far the greatest contaminant in the system is sewage, courtesy of the failing infrastructure in Newcastle. “None of the samples initially taken by the municipality were from within our premises, until it was ordered in High Court to do so,” said Cassim.

“The court ordered the municipality and us to take samples from the wash process, together with our own experts, to determine whether the effluent from the laundry was harmful to aquatic life or livestock.

“The results were presented, showing that effluent was not harmful to the above, thus concluding that all the statements made regarding the pollution from the laundry were false.

“These results concluded the entire case.”

Cassim is axed from ActionSA

The 2021 local government elections saw the IFP take over from the ANC as the ruling party of the Newcastle Local Council.

With this change in leadership, Cassim was appointed as chief whip on November 22, 2021.

He resigned as chief whip on January 11, 2022, and served as an ordinary member of council until August 30, 2023.

Thereafter, he was elected to serve on the council’s Executive Committee. On November 1, 2023, Cassim sued the municipality for R18 million in respect of the economic loss he suffered as a result of the municipality’s 2021 court action against Newcastle Industrial Launders.

This case is yet to be finalised.

A year later, Cassim was fired from ActionSA and subsequently lost his seat on the council.

In a press statement he issued on November 11, 2024, Michael Beaumont explained that, “ActionSA’s investigations have already revealed, separate from the legal action for loss of revenue, the municipality voluntarily agreed to settle R1.2 million in legal fees with Cassim in March 2023, which was made an order of court. “The fact that this was paid without any evidence presented of a resolution or record in council, which is required by law, and without any measures to disclose or mitigate an obvious conflict of interest, is of serious concern to ActionSA.”

Besides dismissing Cassim, ActionSA also laid a complaint with the Public Protector to ensure that the matter was investigated.

Beaumont lodged a complaint with the Public Protector on November 15, 2024, on behalf of ActionSA, alleging that Cassim had used his position of authority in the council to influence municipal officials to consent to the discharge of the interim interdict obtained in the Pietermaritzburg High Court against Cassim’s laundry business in 2021.

Beaumont further alleged that Cassim unduly influenced municipal officials to consent to the payment of the legal costs incurred by NIL.

According to Beaumont, Cassim was the Chief Whip of the Newcastle council when the settlement negotiations between NIL and the municipality took place.

However, this was proven incorrect by the municipal manager, Zamani Mcineka, who pointed out that Cassim resigned from his position as Chief Whip in January 2022. Mcineka further provided investigators with a copy of a court order, dated March 13, 2023, compelling the municipality to pay Cassim’s legal costs.

He explained to the public protector that an out of court settlement was concluded between the municipality and NIL after the case against NIL was withdrawn, and the municipality was ordered to pay the agreed costs of NIL.

The settlement in question…

On April 6, 2023, the municipality entered into a settlement agreement with NIL in which it agreed to pay a sum of R1 137 663.36.

The payment did not relate solely to legal costs. It included travel costs for five trips Cassim made from Newcastle to the High Court in Pietermaritzburg at R10 652 per trip, three trips from Newcastle to consult with advocates in Durban at R8 296 per trip, water testing at a cost of R37 882.80, the hire of a water truck for R640 000 and legal costs of R440 832.56.

The municipality paid Cassim the total amount in three equal instalments which were made over a period of three months on April 6, 2023, May 9, 2023 and June 7, 2023.

The lead investigator from the office of the Public Protector sought further information and clarity from Beaumont on three different occasions, on November 24, 2024, on December 11, 2024, and on February 10, 2025.

However, there was never any response from Beaumont.

The investigator reached out to Beaumont a fourth time on November 17, 2025, in connection with the intended closure of the matter. Still no response was given.

Attempts made by the Northern Natal News to reach Beaumont telephonically for an explanation were unsuccessful at the time of print.

Following its investigation, the office of the Public Protector found that, payments from the municipality to NIL flowed directly from the court order issued on March 13, 2023.

Therefore, compliance with the court order was a mandatory legal obligation and the subsequent settlement agreement merely quantified and implemented the court order.

It did not create any new financial obligation.

Cassim is keen to return to politics – but never again with ActionSA Cassim says he is satisfied that the investigation by the Public Protector clears his name.

He added that ActionSA was wrong to terminate his service as a councillor, especially since they had done so without allowing him the opportunity to defend himself in a disciplinary hearing, as is usually the case.

Cassim believes that allegations against him were made by members of his party who were vying for his position both within ActionSA and in the council.

“Months before I was axed, I reported to the ActionSA leadership that there was a plot to have me removed from the party through devious means, and I provided them with documentary proof and voice recordings from meetings that were held behind my back so that they were aware of what was happening. However, it was just swept under the carpet. The reason why is beyond me,” he said.

Cassim vehemently denies there was any political interference that influenced the outcome of the court proceedings.

“The matter, which began in 2021, was only resolved in 2023. The reason it took this long is because we allowed the proper court process to unfold till the end. We were never the culprits for the pollution in the river. The water analysis shows the river is polluted with sewage as a result of the failing infrastructure,” he continued.

Cassim says he is keen to return to politics, however, he will not work with ActionSA ever again. “I enjoyed every part of being a councillor.

It was enjoyable to me to be able to work with the community and help fix the issues in the town.

“As a councillor, I would work 12 to 14 hours a day, seven days a week and I was on standby 24 hours a day. By the time I had to leave the council, I had earned the respect of all the political parties, as well as the municipal staff because of the good work that I did,” he concluded.

“This whole thing has affected me mentally, emotionally, medically and financially. It not only affected me and my family, it also affected those members of the community who relied on me for support over the past 18 years. I would like to thank all of the people who believed in us …who knew that this matter was politically motivated from the start.”

Commenting on behalf of the Newcastle and District Residents Association, Matthew Shunmugam, was quick to point out that there is a difference between a court order and a consent judgement, in respect of the payment made to NIL.

The fundamental difference lies in how the directive is created

“A court order is imposed by a judge or magistrate after a contested hearing or trial. A consent judgment is a private settlement agreement between the parties that is submitted to the court to be made an official, binding order.”

“A consent judgement means both parties were working together and Cassim was part of the coalition government with the IFP at the time,” Shunmugam opined.

“As a public office bearer, Cassim must be open to criticism,” he added, before declining to comment further saying he has not had sight of the legal documents.

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