Staff exodus at Johannesburg Roads Agency – report

The Business Day reports that both managing director Dr Sean Phillips and company secretary Karen Mills were frogmarched out of the Johannesburg Roads Agency (JRA) headquarters last Thursday.

Dr Phillips, who worked as the director-general in the department of planning, monitoring and evaluation before joining the municipal-owned entity in March 2016, is understood to have tendered his resignation last Tuesday.

In the same week in which the municipal-owned entity, a critical driver of DA mayor Herman Mashaba’s infrastructure development project to stimulate Johannesburg’s economy through constructing and repairing roads, lost its head of infrastructure development, Mpho Kau.

According to the publication, the board decided to forego the option to have Phillips serve his notice period while Mills was suspended for making a protected disclosure to Major-General Shadrack Sibiya regarding financial maladministration within the entity.

IFP member of Mashaba’s mayoral committee, Nonhlanhla Makhubo, recently appointed the owner of a famed restaurant on Vilakazi Street, Sipho Tshabalala, as the chairperson of the new board. It was revealed that Tshabalala’s arrival triggered a series of tip-offs between Mills and group governance unit of the city’s administration.

Mills is reported to have been ordered to communicate with the independent chairperson of the board’s audit and risk committee. She was allegedly also told not to approach the sole shareholder, the City, with further information.

This appear to have motivated Mills decision to approach Sibiya, the head of the Anti-Corruption Unit. Upon discovering the disclosure, the board issued Mills with a letter of suspension. This is despite Protected Disclosure Act unambiguously protecting the witness against victimisation.

Tshabala is reported as saying the resignations and the suspensions were related. Miles confirmed her suspension and accused the board of using improper channels to gain access to her protected disclosure to Sibiya.