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Deputy Mayor Gary van Niekerk charged with fraud over alleged misuse of municipal funds

Deputy Mayor Gary van Niekerk charged with fraud over alleged misuse of municipal funds
Estelle Ellis
By Estelle Ellis
12 Dec 2024
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Former Nelson Mandela Bay mayor, now deputy mayor, Gary van Niekerk briefly appeared in court on Thursday morning, 12 December 2024, on charges of fraud relating to the alleged unauthorised use of municipal funds. Van Niekerk, representing the National Alliance in the council, is part of the ruling coalition with the ANC. He said on Thursday that he had not been asked by the ANC to step aside while his court case was ongoing.

Former mayor, now deputy mayor Gary van Niekerk briefly appeared in court on Thursday morning and was charged with fraud relating to the alleged misuse of municipal funds to hire an attorney for himself.

Van Niekerk, whose National Alliance party is one of the smaller parties in a coalition with the governing ANC in the metro, said he had not been asked to step aside by the mayor.

He arrived at the council meeting after an outfit change, switching from a blue suit to a dark grey suit with a red tie.

Van Niekerk was summoned by the Hawks to appear in court on a charge of fraud, and stands accused of fraudulently obtaining legal representation using council funding after he was removed from his seat and was about to lose his job as Speaker due to internal party squabbles.

The charges relate to an incident in May 2022, when Van Niekerk was the Speaker of the highly unstable Nelson Mandela Bay council. At the time, current Speaker Eugene Johnson was the mayor.

Suspended City Manager Noxolo Nqwazi, who also has been criminally charged in unrelated matters and is currently on trial, had declared Van Niekerk’s seat vacant after she received a letter from his party, then known as the Northern Alliance, saying he was no longer a member.

This was later overturned by a court order, but Van Niekerk was accused of using a council letterhead to obtain the legal services of an attorney — even though he was no longer the Speaker at the time.

He has admitted to writing the letter, saying that he was acting “in defence of the Office of the Speaker”, but an internal investigation by councillors found that he wrote the letter after his seat had already been declared vacant and he had lost his job as Speaker.

After the Eastern Cape Division of the High Court in Gqeberha overturned the decision to have his seat declared vacant, he returned as Speaker, to then become mayor after a coalition shift in the council. Last month the ANC’s Babalwa Lobishe became the mayor, and Van Niekerk became the deputy mayor.

Found guilty


In an internal report, adopted by the council in November, Van Niekerk was found guilty of misrepresenting himself to the attorneys as a councillor and Speaker of the council, even though his seat had been declared vacant.

It is alleged that Van Niekerk had received legal services worth R551,586, provided on the basis that the municipality would pay for it. The legal representatives chosen by Van Niekerk were not on the municipality’s panel of attorneys.

Van Niekerk has been charged with four charges: two counts of fraud and two counts of contravening Section 173 of the Municipal Finance Management Act. The allegations include his actions during a time when he was not a councillor or Speaker of council, yet allegedly impersonated such positions to obtain unauthorised legal services for personal party matters. 

In October, Johannesburg Mayor Dada Morero placed the City’s member of the mayoral committee (MMC) for community development, and his predecessor Kabelo Gwamanda, on special leave with immediate effect after he was charged with fraud.

Gwamanda, a member of Al Jama-ah, was also part of the ANC coalition in the City of Johannesburg. Morero said at the time that Gwamananda’s arrest on fraud charges was “enough for the ANC’s internal step-aside rule to kick in”.

This rule is an internal policy of the ANC, which requires members charged with corruption or other serious crimes to voluntarily step aside from executive roles, or face suspension.

Read more: Joburg mayor invokes ANC step-aside rule after Al Jama-ah member Gwamanda’s arrest

Gwamanda was arrested on Friday, 18 October 2024 for allegedly swindling Soweto residents in a funeral insurance scam in 2011 and 2012. 

Lobishe has not yet commented on whether she will ask Van Niekerk to step aside. Metro spokesperson Sithembiso Soyaya said it would be determined by the council.

Van Niekerk is due back in court on 15 January 2025. DM

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