Four former South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) journalists will find out next week whether or not they will be reinstated at the public broadcaster with their lawyer arguing that their dismissals were unconstitutional.
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But Budlender has not only asked the court to overturn the firing, suspension and disciplinary hearings of the journalists involved, he has also asked the court to order the SABC to file affidavits to indicate which officials were responsible for the decision.
Solidarity chief executive officer, Dirk Hermann, said in a statement he was convinced that the union’s legal team had managed to persuade the court the dismissal of the four journalists was unlawful and in breach of legislation.
Van Niekerk was handing down a judgment by judge Robert Lagrange, who presided over the matter.
SABC COO Hlaudi Motsoeneng initially said after the ruling that no one could tell the SABC what to do and that they would challenge Icasa’s decision in court.
On Friday the axed SABC employees argued that they were targeted because they could not comply with their journalistic ethics and the broadcaster’s protest policy at the same time. “[They said] “we can’t do both”.
The four journalists were charged with contravening their employment contracts, after they criticised internal editorial policies at the state broadcaster.
He says that the SABC had no right to relieve them of their duties in the way that they did.
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He was responding to advocate Steven Budlender, representing Foeta Krige, Suna Venter, Krivani Pillay and Jacques Steenkamp, three of the seven full-time SABC journalists who were fired this week for opposing the SABC’s protest broadcast policy.
