CIVIC activist group, Save Our Berea (SOB), which has for years been calling for municipal officials to be held responsible for the decisions has welcomed a recent court ruling in which a R80-million tender bungle, relating for informal housing, has called on officials to pay legal costs.
The civic organisation is hoping this latest ruling will lay down a precedent for future cases.
In a judgment on Wednesday, 16 eThekwini Municipal, including the city manager, were ordered to pay the costs of litigation over a tender involving a water loss insurance contract.
According to the judgment by Durban High Court judge Dhaya Pillay, the officials knowingly acted unlawfully in the matter which came before her as an urgent application last year by an unsuccessful tenderer, Westwood Insurance Brokers, which sought to have the decision by the city to award the tender to competitor, South West Brokers, set aside.
The judge said unless the officials, which include the city manager who approved the awarding of the tender, the head of water and sanitation, the deputy head of supply chain operations and some members of the bid evaluation committee and the bid adjudication committee, successfully appealed the order, they would have to collectively share 50 per cent of the costs of litigation in the matter.
South West would be responsible for the other 50 per cent.
Pillay has ordered the current acting city manager to report back to her by the end of July on what steps have been taken to recover the money.
SOB’s Kevin Dunkley said the organisation had form some time supported a drive for courts to hold politicians and public officials personally responsible for legal costs where their actions are proved to be illegal and corrupt or where there is blatant incompetence.
“It is morally wrong that a taxpayer, who is forced to go to court at great expense, usually to overturn a bad decision and often an action that is against our constitution, then finds a politician or public servant using public money to defend the indefensible. SOB has first hand experience of this situation,” he said.
He said the 317 Currie Road debacle was a case in point where citizens were fighting for their rights and the City was defending the indefensible using ratepayer’s money in the high court and in the appeal court in Bloemfontein.
Politicians and officials will think twice before making ridiculous decisions if the courts make them pay out of their pockets. It is called accountability and every citizen should applaud the courts for this initiative,” he said.
