Judge crushes Mamusa Municipality's attempt to bring back fired manager

The Mahikeng High Court has thrown out three council decisions that put Rantsho Reuben Gincane back in office as municipal manager of the Mamusa Local Municipality. The council had fired him over his qualifications.

Judge AH Petersen declared Gincane's reinstatement null and void. He also rejected the council's version of the meeting where Gincane was supposedly brought back, calling it far-fetched.

The council and Gincane must pay the costs on the punitive attorney-and-client scale, jointly and severally.

The case was brought by councillor and former Speaker Batsi Gotsilekgosi.

The council terminated Gincane's employment on 16 August 2024. It said his appointment was null and void because he lacked the prescribed qualifications, and that he had misrepresented them.

The judgment records that he never produced the certificate in municipal finance management the post required.

"It is common cause that, notwithstanding repeated requests by the Municipality, the second respondent has never produced a CPMD certificate. What he has produced, and continues to rely on, are a letter from the University of the Witwatersrand referring to him as a 'learner' on certain modules, and a statement of results issued by the relevant Sector Education and Training Authority (SETA). Neither document states, in terms, that he completed the programme or was awarded the certificate."

The judge did not find that Gincane lied about his qualifications. He made no finding that Gincane failed to complete the programme or misrepresented anything.

The council says it reinstated Gincane on 18 March 2025. That was a special meeting called to deal with unpaid February salaries and a National Treasury intervention.

Gotsilekgosi, then Speaker, said he adjourned the meeting and no resolution was taken. The council says the meeting reconvened and voted Gincane back. But it conceded there is no record of that part of the meeting. When Gotsilekgosi refused to sign the minutes, Executive Mayor Mittah Chelechele signed them instead.

The judge rejected the council's version.

"In my view the respondents' version, that the meeting was briefly adjourned and thereafter reconvened to adopt the reinstatement resolution, does not withstand scrutiny and falls to be rejected as far-fetched. The official Rule 53 record ends with the Speaker adjourning the meeting 'until further notice' and contains no recorded reconvened proceedings."

"The respondents offer no satisfactory explanation for the absence of a record of the alleged continuation of a publicly broadcast meeting."

The court also found that the council had dumped a nationally advertised recruitment process to bring Gincane back.

"At the time the second respondent was reinstated, a lawful recruitment process to fill the very same post, advertised nationally and already attracting applicants, was under way. It was abandoned without notice or consultation to accommodate his return."

The judge said calling it a reinstatement did not change what it was.

"In the circumstances of this case, the Council could not bypass the prescribed recruitment process merely by describing its decision to fill the post as reinstatement. A decision to appoint taken in that manner is an appointment 'otherwise made in contravention of this Act', and it is null and void under s 54A(3)(b)."

Even if the vote had happened, the judge said, it would still have been unlawful. The reinstatement was not on the agenda of the special meeting.

"On the respondents' reading, any resolution on any subject could be adopted at a special meeting, provided that the stated item was first debated. That would make the rule meaningless."

On 22 April 2025, Gincane himself convened a council meeting. That meeting removed Gotsilekgosi as Speaker and "ratified" the March reinstatement.

The court found Gotsilekgosi never refused to call the meeting. He had said the proposed timetable did not allow proper notice.

"A request under s 29(1) cannot oblige a Speaker to convene a meeting on terms that would contravene the law and the Council's standing orders," the judge said.

The ratification failed too.

"A subsequent vote of approval cannot supply the advertisement and competitive selection required by s 54A. Nor can it establish retrospectively that a resolution was adopted at a meeting at which none was adopted."

On 18 August 2025, the council went further and rescinded its 2024 termination. The judgment notes it did so despite a directive from the North West MEC for Cooperative Governance to rescind the reinstatement. The court set that resolution aside as well.

The council argued that Gincane had stabilised the municipality's finances. Gotsilekgosi answered with internal memos showing salaries were still paid late from September 2025 to May 2026, and an Eskom notice from March 2026 threatening to cut supply.

The judge said competence did not save an unlawful appointment.

"More fundamentally, an unlawful appointment is not rendered fit for preservation merely because the incumbent is thought, on a disputed record, to be administratively capable."

On costs, the judge singled out the council and Gincane.

"The Municipality gave effect to the asserted March reinstatement, confirmed it through subsequent resolutions and defended it without supplying a coherent account of the meeting said to have authorised it. The second respondent personally relied on that asserted authority to resume the office, convene the April meeting and obtain access to the Municipality's bank account."

The court ordered Mamusa to restart the recruitment within 60 days, or begin a fresh national process. Any acting appointment must meet the Systems Act requirements.

The court refused Gotsilekgosi's bid to bar Gincane from municipal manager posts for five years. It also declined to order individual councillors to pay costs personally.

Gincane was first appointed in November 2022. After his termination, First National Bank refused to recognise his authority over the municipality's accounts. He later got an order in the Pretoria High Court giving him access to them. The court left that order untouched.

The judgment was handed down on 3 November 2026.