THE Public Service Commission has rejected an application by Windhoek mayor Agnes Kafula to go on paid leave from her job at the Ministry of Home Affairs and Immigration during her tenure at the city.
On top of her job as the chief control officer at the Home Affairs ministry headquarters in Windhoek, Kafula is also the president of the Association for Local Authorities in Namibia (ALAN).
The chairperson of the Public Service Commission, Eddy Amkongo, yesterday confirmed to The Namibian that the Commission was consulted this year to look into whether it was permissible for Kafula to go on paid leave while she serves as the mayor.
“We found out there is no possibility of her going on paid leave. The Commission advised that there is no legislation that allows her to be on extended leave unless it is unpaid,” Amkongo explained.
He also said the Commission had, instead, advised that if Kafula would like to temporarily step down from her job, then she could go on unpaid leave.
Kafula made the request this year, a few months after The Namibian reported that senior managers in the Home Affairs ministry had accused her of neglecting her daily job to concentrate on her position as mayor.
Amkongo admitted that the election of Kafula as mayor of Windhoek meant that her work at the ministry would suffer because as a staff member of the public service, she was required to devote her time to the government job.
Home Affairs permanent secretary Patrick Nandago yesterday confirmed that consultations on the way forward regarding Kafula’s situation were ongoing.
Like in the past, Nandago reiterated that he believed the issue should not be about Kafula but the system which allowed civil servants to serve as councillors.
Kafula declined to comment on whether she would sacrifice her job at Home Affairs and opt for unpaid leave.
She, however, admitted that as Mayor of Windhoek, it was a “heavy responsibility that cannot be handled by someone with a job somewhere,” because at the end of the day, “you will do injustice to both sides”.
“There are times when there are appointments with the municipality which coincide with meetings at Home Affairs. What you do is you tend to sacrifice one of them,” she added.
Speaking as president of ALAN, Kafula said they were working on reforms to the Local Authority Act of 1992 to make mayors and councillors full-time employees.
She said consultations were done in form of workshops and they had approached the Minister of Regional and Local Government, Housing and Rural Development, Charles Namoloh, who told them that he was working on the issue and that he would table the motion in Cabinet.
A storm erupted in local authority circles three years ago following the announcement of an ‘idea’ by former Regional and Local Government Minister Jerry Ekandjo to appoint executive mayors and management committees as full-time employees. The plan received mixed reactions.
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