Organised agriculture in KwaZulu-Natal added its voice to widespread condemnation of the proposed transfer of the province’s unpopular previous regional land claims commissioner Siduduzile Sosibo to the same position for Mpumalanga.
Staff of the Mpumalanga Regional Land Claims Commission (RLCC) offices, together with land claimants in that province, have already held protests to oppose the redeployment.
“It seems preposterous that an official who plainly failed to deal with her role here in KwaZulu-Natal can be considered for the position in Mpumalanga that is not likely to be any less complex,” said Robin Barnsley, KwaZulu-Natal Agricultural Union’s president.
“What will it take for responsible governance to be seen in such an important position and for the ruling party and government to move away from cadre deployment?” Barnsley asked.
Sosibo has been surrounded by controversy since being accused of incompetence, abuse of authority, ineffective leadership and fraud during her term as KwaZulu-Natal’s RLCC commissioner.
The outcry against Sosibo was such that in October 2008 she was redeployed to the National Land
Claims Commission’s offices in Gauteng, pending the outcome of official investigations. Government investigators never revealed the outcome of these investigations to KwaZulu-Natal RLCC staff or the public.
Meanwhile, rumours abounded that Sosibo was still indirectly running the KwaZulu-Natal RLCC office from Gauteng, allegedly under the protection of chief land claims commissioner Blessing Mphela and director-general of the land affairs department Tozi Gwanya.
Spokesperson for the Mpumalanga chapter of the National Education and Allied Workers’ Union
December Mavuso said his union is taking the grievances of Mpumalanga RLCC members against Sosibo’s transfer very seriously.
“We have engaged the MEC of agriculture in the province to see how this situation can be resolved,”
Mavuso said. – Lloyd Phillips
Source: farmersweekly.co.za
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