Thozamile Semekazi testifies before the Judicial Conduct Tribunal on Tuesday. Photo: The South African Judiciary/Facebook
- Judge Belinda Hartle’s lawyers say a clerk’s complaint that she swore at him and used the “k-word” is revenge for an article her husband wrote.
- The article referred to an anonymous letter in which the clerk, Thozamile Semekazi, was accused of soliciting bribes.
- Semekazi denied the bribery claim and broke down while being questioned about his health on Tuesday.
Judge Belinda Hartle’s lawyers say the accusation that she swore at a registry clerk and used the k-word was an “act of reprisal” for an article by her husband that reported the clerk had been accused of taking bribes.
Thozamile Semekazi was one of two Mthatha High Court officials named in an article by journalist Ray Hartle, the judge’s husband, published in Daily Maverick on 5 May 2025. It reported that Semekazi had been accused in an anonymous letter of soliciting bribes to file documents. He denied this at the time.
Semekazi, who had been transferred to the East London High Court, alleges that ten days later, on 15 May 2025, Hartle launched into an angry tirade in her secretary’s office because he had delivered case flow management files late.
The Judicial Conduct Committee found in December 2025 that there was a prima facie case of gross misconduct and referred the complaint to a Judicial Conduct Tribunal. The tribunal began hearing evidence in Sandton on Monday.
Semkazi alleges Hartle said “f*** you” and “p**s man” twice before commenting on staff at the general office, calling them “bleddy f***ing [k-word]s”.
Hartle admits to using only a single “expletive”, which is backed up by her secretary, Shakira Frost.
Frost says in her affidavit, which was admitted as evidence before the tribunal on Tuesday, that Hartle had said she was “tired of staff from the registrar’s office f***ing her around”.
She had then put her hand over her mouth, saying “oops, I used a swear word” and had apologised to both Frost and Semekazi.
But Semekazi said on Tuesday that this was all lies.
Earlier in the proceedings, evidence leader advocate Benny Kalakgosi admitted into evidence WhatsApp messages exchanged between Hartle and Semekazi, both on the day of the incident and on the day after.
In the first, Hartle wrote: “I realised I used a swear word giving meaning to my frustration just now”.
She said this was not intentional and not directed at him personally. She apologised for any offence.
Semekazi wrote back: “It is the first time in my 23 years of working in this department that I have been sworn to and from someone in your position. You degraded me in front of your secretary and belittled me which is so humiliating … Even your expression and your outrage towards me was so unprofessional and sad.”
Again, Hartle wrote that “the word slipped from my mouth” and apologised.
The next day she messaged that she had left a “peace offering” on his desk, agreeing that it was unprofessional to “lose her cool”.
Hartle’s advocate Jan Heunis, while cross-examining Semekazi on Tuesday, asked why he did not reference the alleged k-word insult in his WhatsApp responses.
Semekazi replied he had “simply been trying to express my feelings”, that he was hurt and upset “and did not have a chance of thinking about other things she also said to me”.
He said he would not have been hurt if the judge had only said “f***”.
Heunis also said that Hartle’s lawyers had suggested both she and Semekazi undergo lie detector tests. But Semekazi had refused.
Heunis said he would argue that Semekazi’s complaint had been an “act of reprisal” for the Daily Maverick article.
Semekazi said he was aware that the article had named him as someone who had taken bribes. But he said it was “all lies.”
Heunis submitted that Semekazi had been in contact with Ray Hartle during 2024, and proof of this through cellphone records and recordings would be submitted to the tribunal, if necessary, when Hartle testified.
Again, Semekazi said this was not true.
Tribunal president Justice Boissie Mbha put the brakes on cross-examination when Semekazi burst into tears while being questioned about his medical and mental health history.
Heunis was asking Semekazi about 15, mainly unsuccessful, applications he had made to be declared temporarily unfit for work between 2023 and 2025. It emerged that one application was because he was going through a divorce.
Semekazi said he could not remember the details of the other applications, but insisted the 15 May incident had resulted in him suffering from severe depression and that he had never been admitted to a mental health facility before.
Wiping away his tears with his jacket sleeves, he said: “My apologies. I did not know that these proceedings would come to this extent, where I am required to disclose problems and my divorce issues.”
Mbha said the records would speak for themselves and there was no need to get into the “nitty gritty”.
The hearing continues.
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