Tribunal rejects bid by harassment accused judge

A South African Judge President's attempt to lead the testimony of his sexual harassment accuser’s former friend – whose statements included claims about Andiswa Mengo’s sex life – has been dismissed by the tribunal tasked with deciding his guilt. JSC Judicial Conduct Tribunal chairperson, retired Judge President Bernard Ngoepe, ruled that, after hearing submissions on whether stenographer Unathi Sogoni should give evidence about her two statements, his panel had decided not to allow that testimony. News24 notes Mengo has previously testified that, between 2021 and 2022 and after discovering that she was a single mother, Eastern Cape Judge President Selby Mbenenge bombarded her with requests for revealing pictures of herself and sexually loaded messages – some of which, she said, she had entertained and responded to because he was her boss. In testimony that has been fiercely denied by Mbenenge, Mengo said he had also sent her images of male genitalia (which she assumed was his) and tried to solicit oral sex from her in a November 2022 interaction in his High Court chambers.

On Friday, Mbenenge’s counsel, Advocate Griffiths Madonsela SC, argued that Sogoni had been called to testify about ‘relations between secretaries and judges’ in an effort, he said, to challenge the evidence given by gender expert Dr Lisa Vetten. In what Mengo’s counsel, Advocate Nazreen Budlender SC, described as a mischaracterisation of Vetten’s testimony, Madonsela maintained that the expert had portrayed the secretary as a ‘child’ who had been subjugated because of the power positions that existed between her and the Judge President. He insisted that Sogoni’s testimony was crucial to challenging this image of the power dynamics between Mengo and Mbenenge. But, reports News24, Ngoepe did not buy that argument. He said: ‘I’ve read these two statements. I’m unable to say that they’re just about the power relations. But I can confidently say that these statements are about the complainant (Mengo).’ While acknowledging that Sogoni’s statements dealt with ‘other aspects’ outside of judge and secretary power relations, Madonsela insisted that this issue was the only thing that he wanted to question her about. ‘That’s the premise of your proposition,’ Ngoepe responded. ‘But I’m telling you, the statements do not deal with the issue of power relations between judges and clerks. They deal with Ms Mengo: her life, her sexual life, and many other aspects of her life… You premise your argument on the theory of power relations. The contents of these statements don’t deal with power relations; they deal with an individual person.’

Sogoni’s statements were inadmissible because, among other things, they largely consisted of hearsay and were ‘prejudicial’ to Mengo (who had not been questioned about the claims made about her), said Ngoepe. ‘Our (the panel's) prima facie view is that she cannot lead evidence about the contents of these two statements,’ he said, before adding that the panel believed Sogoni’s testimony was about Mengo’s character. During her brief evidence before the tribunal, notes News24, Sogoni testified that, while she had become friends with Mengo in 2019, they had fallen out because of ‘the way she conducts herself and the way she treats other people’. It was apparent, Budlender said, that the relationship between the two women was ‘fractious’, suggesting the value of Sogoni’s evidence on power relations was somewhat questionable. Evidence leader Salome Scheepers had also objected to the manouevre, saying that the paragraphs Madonsela said he intended to canvass evidence on are irrelevant, notes a report in the Saturday Star. ‘I am of the view that it is not relevant. These lines here are completely different from what the case is before us. It’s not placed before us here that the complainant is a seducer. Nothing like that was ever led or put to the complainant,’ said Scheepers. Mbenenge, who has vehemently denied that he harassed Mengo, will take the stand this week.

Full Saturday Star report

Full News24 report