[1] At issue in this application is whether a fixed contract of employment was validly concluded between the respondent and the applicant’s former acting municipal manager.  The agreement, or the purported agreement as the applicant calls it, was concluded on 27 June 2012.   The applicant seeks a declarator to the effect that the agreement be declared null and void ab initio, for want of statutory compliance.

[2] The respondent was appointed and employed as the applicant’s Chief Operations Official (COO). As such he was a “manager directly accountable to the municipal manager”.  He was appointed for a fixed term of 5 years, effective from 1 August 2007, after which would term the agreement would terminate on 30 August 2012. This agreement was concluded on 3 October 2007.

[3] Upon the termination of the aforesaid agreement (‘the first contract”), the respondent was appointed for a further term of three months from 1 September until the end of November 2012. Another contract of employment was concluded in terms of which he was employed in the same post until the end of February 2013.  However, the post of Municipal Manager became vacant during December 2012, and the respondent was appointed to that post in an acting capacity until 28 February 2013, or until a permanent municipal manager was appointed, whichever occurred first.