“This represents a defining moment in the history of UCT. It must be handled with utmost rigour, conscientiousness and objectivity,” reads a letter from the law firm Webber Wentzel, sent on behalf of the UCT Academics’ Union to the UCT Council on Monday.

The “moment” referred to in the legal letter is the UCT governance crisis, first brought to public attention in early October. Allegations of misconduct, which focused on UCT’s vice-chancellor, Mamokgethi Phakeng, and the chair of the UCT Council, Babalwa Ngonyama, are now set to be probed by an independent panel chaired by a retired judge — but the UCT Academics’ Union still has some serious concerns.

Foremost is the fact that the most recent council meetings discussing the governance issues have been chaired by the body’s deputy, Pheladi Gwangwa.

Gwangwa, a lawyer by training, is a director of the Pretoria-based law firm MM Chueu Inc. She was the station manager of Johannesburg talk radio station 702 between 2005 and 2016.

As reported by Daily Maverick after the council’s 15 October meeting, Gwangwa’s refusal to recuse herself from chairing the gathering became the subject of a fiery debate which occupied more than half of the meeting’s six-hour duration.  

Now, the UCT Academics’ Union has said that Gwangwa’s conduct “requires immediate attention”.

A number of the issues central to the current governance crisis are related to human resources — such as the circumstances around the departure of senior administrator Lis Lange and the departures of other members of the university leadership team.

“[Gwangwa] is obviously conflicted, given that [she] has, and continues to hold, the position of Chairperson of UCT’s Human Resources Committee, since 1 July 2020,” the union wrote in its Monday letter.

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“[Gwangwa] is also a member of the university’s Remunerations Committee (‘RemCom’), which has responsibility for, inter alia, determining the remuneration packages (including salaries, bonuses and benefits in kind) of individual executive staff of UCT, including that of vice-chancellors and deputy vice-chancellors, [and] for approving severance packages for all staff where the severance package would be in excess of the formula approved by council.”

Under these circumstances, the union wrote, Gwangwa was “integrally involved” in recent administrator departures, and her failure to recuse herself from meetings discussing these matters “breaches the Higher Education Act, the UCT Conflict of Interests Policy, and the UCT Statute”.

Gwangwa’s post-meeting memo to the UCT community regarding the council decisions taken on 15 October also omitted certain key details, such as the fact that the independent panel looking into the governance issues will be chaired by a retired judge.

The UCT Academics’ Union has accused her of having “misrepresented the outcome” of the meeting by omitting this detail.

Also absent from Gwangwa’s post-meeting report: the fact that “the target of the investigation is potential misconduct on the part of the vice-chancellor and the chair of council”, wrote the union, and the fact that Gwangwa “refused to recuse herself from the vote despite being requested by her colleagues to do so”.

The union is demanding that the UCT Council takes “immediate disciplinary steps” against Gwangwa and ensures that she is blocked from any further participation in matters relating to the current crisis.

The union notes with concern that it has been informed that Gwangwa “is apparently attempting to have a significant say in choosing the five members of the independent investigative panel and to determine other arrangements in this regard, in circumstances where she has and is reasonably perceived to have a vested interest in the outcome”.

Although the decision to establish an independent panel was hailed by many as an overdue victory for good governance, the investigation’s terms of reference are still unclear.

Daily Maverick understands that contestation over the members of the panel, as well as the process to be followed, is already heated.

The UCT Academics’ Union stated in its Monday letter that in order for the probity of such an inquiry to be beyond reproach, the entire council should be involved in nominating panel members, and a public statement should be published clarifying the process to be followed.

This is the second lawyer’s letter to be sent by the union to the council in recent weeks, demanding an end to illegal and unprocedural actions. 

“The allegations against the vice-chancellor and the chair of council are of the most serious kind. The reputation and character of the university are at stake,” the union concludes.

“[The UCT Academics’ Union] and the hundreds of faculty members whom it represents have an abiding interest to ensure that the process followed in this matter is meticulous and discovers the truth, and that the appropriate consequences flow from the outcome of truth-seeking.”

The letter continues: “[The union] is committed to ensuring that good governance, proper process and accountability prevail, and will not hesitate to exercise its legal rights as necessary to ensure compliance and that these critical issues are not treated superficially or swept under the rug.”

The union is demanding a response from the council by 28 October. DM