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Namibia: Keetmans Acting CEO Faces ACC
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The Namibian (Windhoek)
8 May 2008
Posted to the web 8 May 2008
Luqman Cloete
Windhoek
THE Keetmanshoop Municipality's Acting Chief Executive Officer, Patrick Hamann, was summoned by the Anti-Corruption Commission (ACC) last week to explain why eviction orders against Town Councillor Basil Brown and CW Pieters have not been enforced.
The court order - to evict Brown and Pieters from town lands - was issued on February 28 by the Keetmanshoop Magistrate's Court.
The Namibian has seen a letter in which the ACC warned that Hamann could face a maximum five-year prison term or a fine of N$100 000 if he failed to comply with the summons.
Hamann was summoned to appear before an ACC investigator in Windhoek on April 24.
ACC Director Paulus Noa confirmed that Hamann had complied with the summons and had been quizzed about the matter.
Noa declined to reveal further details, only saying that the investigation would be finalised soon.
The ACC asked Hamann to provide copies of all council correspondence on the eviction matter since he took office in January.
Additionally, the ACC wanted to see documents which could demonstrate why Brown and Pieters were still occupying the town lands despite the court order.
The eviction orders against Brown, the Town Council's management chairperson, and Pieters were issued when they refused to vacate the town lands after their lease agreements with the council expired in 2006.
According to a source, on March 6 Hamann allegedly instructed the council's legal representative to put on hold the issuing of a final court order without the council's blessing.
"Before he approached the lawyer with the request to withhold the issuing of the final court eviction order, Hamann simply did not respond to the lawyer's correspondence requesting further instructions to enforce the final eviction order after it surfaced that the two leaseholders were reluctant to vacate the land," according to the source.
The source claimed that for personal reasons Hamann had deliberately delayed having the final eviction order enforced by the council's legal representatives, charges Hamman has dismissed out of hand.
The source alleged the delay could be linked to misconduct charges Hamann faces.
These are related to assignments he allegedly failed to complete and which allegedly cost the council a lot of money.
"I can guarantee you that not a single misconduct charge against me would hold water," Hamman said when contacted for comment, rubbishing claims of trying to cover up for Councillor Brown.
"I'm not here to please people but to build a career," Hamann said. Hamann pinned the delay in dealing with the lease issue on council inefficiency.
"To avoid being portrayed as taking sides, I pressed the council to finalise the camp issue to no avail during council meetings," Hamann said.
"Four councillors, who claimed that a council resolution to have the two leaseholders evicted was unconstitutional, instructed me to halt the eviction process," he added.
Hamann also came out firing against claims that he wanted his misconduct charges dropped.
"I wrote a memo on February 26 to the HR department requesting it to finalise the misconduct charges against me," he claimed.
The council's human resources manager, Andre Blaauw, confirmed having received a memo from Hamann.
"Inefficiency of staff in the HR department now makes me the scapegoat in the whole town land issue from which I did not benefit anything at all," Hamann said angrily.
Hamann threatened to take legal action against the sources, who he said were hell-bent on vilifying him.
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"The defamation game has now become ridiculous, it is going to the level that my work ethics are now questioned," Hamann said.
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| Copyright © 2008 The Namibian. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections -- or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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