Despite work piling up, services at the provincial co-operative governance department were at a standstill for a week after a woman employee allegedly painted the walls with her own human waste in the Bhisho headquarters.
The incident was captured on CCTV.
This led the department to hold an urgent internal investigation into the matter while for more than a week senior officials refused to return to work until deep cleaning had been properly conducted.
One of the senior officials, who did not want to be named, said they were frustrated by the department’s failure to respond quickly to the matter.
The official said staff, including senior managers, felt witchcraft could have been behind the incident and felt “deep fear”..
It is said to have happened during the weekend of January 18 and was discovered on Monday January 20.
“We clocked in as we normally do and the people who arrived very early noticed this at about 6.45am.
“It was all over. And what is worse, the person who did this is known because there is CCTV footage.”
The source said some staff members were afraid of witchcraft.
“We are quite scared by what this could mean.
“No-one wanted to get close to it because of fear since, depending on what you believe, we know what these things could mean.”
The disgruntled employee is said to have sneaked to the third floor of the building and smeared her excrement on corridor walls and the office door handles of certain senior officials.
The woman’s motivation is not clear.
The third floor houses three entities falling under the department of co-operative governance and traditional affairs — integrated development planning (IDP), inter-governmental relations and public participation units.
The source said: “Obviously, services are disrupted.
“We just come in, clock in and then leave.
“It’s a busy season of the year and the component most hit is IDP.”
These bodies feed plans to municipalities on how resources are allocated, which in turn become part of municipal budgets.
Cogta provincial spokesperson Mamnkeli Ngam said the department was aware of the “unfortunate” incident.
“Deep cleaning has been done [and it will] be followed by fumigation towards a habitable working environment.
“An investigation and other employee-related matters are being undertaken.”
He declined to comment on whether the perpetrator had been identified.
“It is an internal matter, we are still conducting an investigation.”
Cogta security head Zandile Mnyandu also declined to comment.
Ngam said staff had returned to work.
Daily Dispatch
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