The Labour Court has overturned a previous arbitration decision that reinstated Nokuthula Ceki, a former office administrator at the Stellenbosch police station in the Western Cape.
Ceki was dismissed after being found guilty of serious misconduct related to her attempts to assist her boyfriend, M. Paulos, one of four suspects linked to an alleged ATM robbery.
The controversy began when charges emerged against Ceki for allegedly attempting to retrieve her boyfriend’s cellphone and engineer an alibi for the arrested suspects back in January 2019.
During arbitration, details about Ceki's actions unfolded. Testifying, the arresting officer, Captain Williams recounted a pivotal moment where Ceki entered a boardroom while he was preparing a statement on the suspects’ arrest.
Williams said Ceki asked what the suspects were arrested for, and he told her that it related to an ATM theft in Stellenbosch and that the hire vehicle they were driving was visible on CCTV footage.
However, Ceki mentioned that the hire car allegedly used in the robbery was in Mbekweni the entire day when the robbery took place. Williams said he did not know how she would have come to know such information. Ceki denied mentioning this.
Williams explained that when Ceki requested permission to collect personal belongings, he allowed only belts and shoelaces. However, when he discovered her attempts to take a phone belonging to one of the suspects, who was also her boyfriend, Williams on instructions of the station commander, opened a criminal case against her but it was later withdrawn.
Moreover, Williams testified that Ceki was not supposed to be at the station at that time. Meanwhile, another witness recounted how Ceki followed officers and suspects to the holding cells without justification and even spoke with the suspects in isiXhosa when the suspects were having their fingerprints taken.
All witnesses in the arbitration said they were puzzled by her interest in the case and wondered why she was only interested in taking the cell phone of one of the suspects whereas all four of them had phones.
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In her defence, Ceki testified that her relationship with Paulos was complex, having been together on and off for a decade. While she admitted to visiting the police station to collect belongings of the suspects, she denied any knowledge of the robbery or her boyfriend's alleged wrongdoing, claiming she was unaware about his activities.
The arbitrator, Maureen De Beer found that Ceki's actions did not specifically violate the public service code, nor did they adversely affect the suspects’ arrest.
De Beer concluded that the only misconduct she was guilty of was of conducting herself in an improper and unacceptable manner.
Regarding the employer's concern that Ceki’s association with a known criminal affected the employee-employer trust relationship, the arbitrator found Ceki’s version that she had no knowledge of her boyfriend’s doings highly unlikely and that her conduct had affected the employer-employee relationship.
Nonetheless, she said could not conclude that the trust relationship was irreparably broken.
In addition, the arbitrator considered that Ceki had five years' service and had a clean disciplinary record, and her conduct had caused no harm to the South African Police Service (SAPS). Moreover, she continued to work for SAPS while the investigation was continuing.
De Beer ruled in Ceki’s favour, ordering her reinstatement with back pay and issuing a final warning.
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However, SAPS contested De Beer’s ruling, prompting a further review by the Labour Court in June 2024.
SAPS argued that the arbitrator had overlooked whether Ceki acted with intent to obstruct investigations. They highlighted that Ceki acknowledged the significance of cellphones in evidence gathering.
In a compelling judgment, Judge Robert Lagrange ruled that the arbitrator's initial assessment was flawed. He asserted that Ceki had exploited her position to manoeuvre access to suspects and potentially interfere with the investigation.
Lagrange underscored that “if Ceki had succeeded in her actions, it would have negatively impacted the investigation,” asserting that her lack of remorse also played a role in the decision.
The judge further stated that the broken trust between Ceki and her employers was palpable, adding that the initial arbitrator's finding lacked grounding in evidence.
Consequently, the Labour Court overturned the arbitrator's decision and ruled that the dismissal was fair.
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