The suspended CEO of the Botswana Tourism Organisation (BTO) recently launched an urgent application before the Industrial Court seeking to halt disciplinary proceedings against her. She claimed the process had been tainted by predetermined bias and that the organisation’s board had already resolved to have her summarily dismissed.
Keitumetse Setlang, who was suspended and charged with numerous offences, alleged the board chairperson had recommended her summary dismissal to the Minister of Environment and Tourism before any disciplinary hearing had taken place. Her attorneys, Ramalepa Attorneys, filed papers on Friday, June 19, just days before the hearing that had been scheduled for June 22. The matter was brought on an urgent basis, with the CEO seeking an interim interdict to prevent the proceedings from going ahead.
In her founding affidavit, Setlang stated that she only discovered the board’s apparent resolution on Thursday, June 18, when she came across court documents filed by another BTO employee, Kgotso Miles Ollyn, who is also facing disciplinary proceedings. Those documents included a letter from the Minister of Environment and Tourism responding to the board chairperson’s recommendation. “The Chairperson of the Board of Directors resolved for me to be summarily dismissed from the Respondent,” Setlang stated in her affidavit. “Had it not been for the Minister of Environment and Tourism rejecting the recommendation for summary dismissal, and if the Board would have had its way, dismissal would have been my fate without further ado.”
According to the court papers, the BTO finally shared some of the requested documents on Thursday evening at 7:50pm, just hours before the urgent application was prepared. Setlang argued this late provision did little to address the evident bias she claims had been formed against her.
Setlang argued that the board had already declared her guilt, rendering any disciplinary hearing a mere formality. “No matter what occurs at the Disciplinary Hearing, and even if the disciplinary panel makes a finding in my favour, the ultimate decision rests with the Respondent’s Board of Directors,” she states. “As such, even if I attend the hearing and set forth my defence, it is deeply disheartening to see that this would not matter at all.”
The application also revealed a dispute over disclosure of documents. Setlang claimed she had requested certain materials necessary for her defence, but the BTO had been reluctant to provide them. In correspondence from June 4, her attorneys requested various documents, but the BTO indicated some would only be provided “at the hearing”. This, Setlang argued, would amount to an ambush, preventing her from adequately preparing her defence. She stated that “the manner in which certain documents were withheld raises further cause for concern,” and that being forced to only have sight of withheld documents during the hearing “is prejudicial due to them ostensibly resigning to ambush me with these only during the hearing.”
According to the court papers, the BTO finally shared some of the requested documents on Thursday evening at 7:50pm, just hours before the urgent application was prepared. Setlang argued this late provision did little to address the evident bias she claims had been formed against her. “I aver that the proceedings would merely be a formality that they are forced to go through to give my ultimate dismissal the air of regularity,” she stated. “This is unjust, as this would mean that I would have been given no genuine hearing at all, due to its outcome already having been pre-determined.”
The CEO argued that the matter should be heard urgently, as the disciplinary hearing had been scheduled for Monday, and refusal to attend or participation in the proceedings would both result in prejudice. She contended that all the requirements for an interim interdict were met: a prima facie right, a reasonable apprehension of irreparable harm, the balance of convenience favouring the interdict, and the absence of any other satisfactory remedy. “I stand to have my fundamental rights infringed should the disciplinary hearing be left to proceed on Monday,” she stated, while adding that she “genuinely struggle(s) to consider the prejudice that the Respondent would suffer if those proceedings be stayed.”
Setlang confirmed in her affidavit that while the urgent application was being prepared, the BTO finally shared some documents, but dismissed this as insufficient. “This last minute somersault from the reluctance in ‘BTO1’ does little to assuage the evident bias formed against me by the Respondent,” she stated.
At the time of publication, the urgent application had not yet been heard by the Industrial Court. The disciplinary hearing that had been scheduled for Monday did not proceed, although not as a result of the pending court application.
