SA Football Association (Safa) vice-president and presidential candidate Ria Ledwaba and her allies allege disciplinary charges against her are aimed at eliminating her from or intimidating her ahead of its leadership election.
Safa CEO Tebogo Motlanthe, however, denies anything untoward about the disciplinary hearing.
Ledwaba’s legal representatives have been fighting the matter on the basis that it is scheduled to be heard before an independent chairperson, adv Terry Motau SC, with her believing she should face a three-person disciplinary committee.
Ledwaba, at a press conference to accept her candidacy to stand against incumbent Danny Jordaan at the June 25 elective congress, described how she became persona non grata at Safa after writing to sports minister Nathi Mthethwa in 2020. Her letter asked for the minister’s intervention after a damning report by former acting CEO Gay Mokoena was sent to the Safa national executive committee (NEC) alleging widespread abuse of office by Jordaan.
Ledwaba and Mokoena were removed as vice-presidents soon after the letter emerged, but Ledwaba was reinstated.
At the press conference, Ledwaba said she wrote to Jordaan in late May 2021 informing him she would contest the presidency.
“And guess what, a week after that I get a letter from a lawyer,” she said.
“Charges of misconduct: ‘You have met with an expelled person, you have met with an external stakeholder and misrepresenting you are representing Safa, all these [social media] posters we see about ‘Operation what-what’, you have created a website’.
“[It came] immediately after a letter I wrote to him [Jordaan] to say: ‘Now I am standing.’ And then I’m subjected to a DC, but I’m challenging that.”
Ledwaba said the charges in the lawyer’s letter were discussed at an NEC meeting in August 2021 and referred for disciplinary proceedings. She said when she received the official document, those charges had changed.
“One of the charges now is that I have written a letter to the minister — something that I took to arbitration and they [Safa] withdrew two years ago.
“And I’m saying this because there is no charge. I have not done anything wrong. I’m sure currently they are saying: ‘Leave her there to be a presidential candidate. We are going to expel her with these charges.’
“I know that’s the intention because the decision of the NEC was: ‘No, let’s not get involved; we are going to be judged because it’s August [and Women’s] Month, that we are victimising a women. Let’s just send the matter to the DC and let it be dealt with there’.”
A source close to Ledwaba, who did not want to be named, said the initial charges in the lawyer’s letter were that she had met with an unnamed expelled person, an external stakeholder misrepresenting she was doing so on behalf of Safa and had created internet posters regarding change being needed at the organisation.
They said these were the charges discussed in the NEC meeting in August 2021.
The source said when the disciplinary charges were arrived at, they were for two different matters — Ledwaba’s letter to Mthethwa and her having met Safa staff member Hendrick Mphahlele without approval.
Three former high-ranking Safa officials, who support Ledwaba’s presidency and did not want to be named, also said the disciplinary charges sought to eliminate the vice-president from the race or at least intimidate her.
Motlanthe denied the charges or lawyer’s letter relating to the disciplinary hearing had emerged soon after Ledwaba informed Safa’s leadership she would stand for the presidency. He said the purpose of the hearing was to give her the chance to be heard on the letter to Mthethwa.
“She was charged long before the elections and she had not in any way formally said to anyone she was going to stand,” Motlanthe said.
“This case has nothing to do with the election. It was decided by the NEC way back to say: ‘Let her be given the right to be heard because to date nobody knows the contents of the letter between her and the minister. She never handed the letter to us.
“The gist of the NEC decision is that she had said she had not been given the opportunity to be heard. Remember, she was suspended [as vice-president] and the suspension was revoked.
“It has nothing to do with elections, but more to do with giving her the right to be heard.”
Motlanthe denied the charges were altered.
“That is also disputed. Nobody discussed the charge sheet in that NEC meeting. The NEC resolved that she must be charged [and] everything untoward that she had done needs to be clarified in front of an independent chairperson.
“On her meeting with Mr Mphahlele, the procedure is that every NEC member must talk to staff through me. And if there was nothing sinister she would not have met with a finance staff member without me.”
Ledwaba has applied in the Pretoria high court to interdict the elective congress alleging procedural irregularities. The case will be heard on Wednesday, after being put back from Tuesday.
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