Hardap, Sankwasa take their tussle back to court

LIKE a failed marriage that just can’t get past the point of a final divorce, the rocky relationship between the Hardap Regional Council and its Chief Regional Officer, Sankwasa James Sankwasa, made a return to the Labour Court this week for the latest round in an ongoing tug-of-war between the two.

Disputes between the Hardap Regional Council and Sankwasa have now reached the point where the Regional Council and Sankwasa are not even agreeing about something as seemingly simple as the question of when Sankwasa’s five-year term as Hardap’s Chief Regional Officer started.The answer to that question could hold the key to solving the latest disagreement that has landed Sankwasa and the Regional Council on opposite sides in a court case.According to Sankwasa, his term comes to an end in August this year. According to the Hardap Regional Council, his term ended at the close of October last year already – which is why the Regional Council notified him of this in late August last year, also adding that the Council had decided not to extend his contract beyond the end of October.Sankwasa won a first round in this dispute on April 8, when labour arbitrator Philip Mwandingi found that the Hardap Regional Council had unfairly ended Sankwasa’s employment contract at the end of October. Mwandingi ordered the Regional Council to reinstate Sankwasa in the position he held until the Council ended his employment at the end of October. Mwandingi also ordered the Regional Council to pay Sankwasa all salaries and benefits that were due to him ‘from the date he was dismissed, being 30 October 2008’, but further ordered that N$36 000 that previously had been paid to Sankwasa ‘erroneously’ should be deducted from this payment.That N$36 000 is tied to the argument that, while Sankwasa only started working for the Hardap Regional Council in August 2004, he was subsequently compensated for lost earnings as if his term as Chief Regional Officer had started in November 2003 already.In an urgent application heard by Judge Collins Parker in the Labour Court on Monday, the Hardap Regional Council asked the court to halt action on the decision by arbitrator Mwandingi until an appeal against Mwandingi’s decision had been finalised.Judge Parker reserved his judgement, which was opposed by Sankwasa.According to documents filed with the court, the Public Service Commission recommended on October 3 2003 that Sankwasa be appointed as Chief Regional Officer of the Hardap Regional Council.According to Hardap Governor Katrina Hanse-Himarwa, because of ‘some organisational and technical impediments’, the Public Service Commission’s recommendation was implemented only in early August the next year, with Sankwasa starting with his duties on August 11 2004.The Governor claims that Sankwasa insisted at the time that his term of office had to be considered retrospectively, from the first month after the Public Service Commission had made its recommendation. The result of this was that the Regional Council eventually agreed to pay Sankwasa an amount that was the difference between the salary he would have been earning if he had been appointed as Chief Regional Officer with effect from November 2003 and the salary that he was actually earning over the months that the recommendation for his appointment was not implemented.According to the Regional Council’s argument the effect of this was that Sankwasa’s term of office then started with effect from the beginning of November 2003.Since taking up his post at Mariental the relationship between Sankwasa and the Regional Council has not been a happy one. On May 12 2006 the Regional Council suspended Sankwasa from his post pending a disciplinary hearing.The suspension dragged on for almost two years, during which Sankwasa was paid his salary, without a disciplinary hearing ever taking place. On March 28 last year, Sankwasa obtained an order in the High Court in which the Regional Council was directed to lift his suspension and allow him to return to his job.The Regional Council was represented in court by Sisa Namandje on Monday. Richard Mueller of the law firm Koep & Partners represented Sankwasa.