LEGISLATION – CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE SERVICE ACT – SECURITY CERTIFICATE

LEGISLATION – CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE SERVICE ACT – SECURITY CERTIFICATE

Having found that the applicant was unfairly dismissed and should be reinstated, the court had to deal with the issue of the applicant’ security certificate which is required in terms of s 8(2) of the Namibia Central Intelligence Service Act of 1997. Counsel for respondents contended that applicant cannot be reinstated because his security certificate lapsed due to his dismissal and there was no security vetting done as was mandatory.

The court disagreed with that argument and reasoned as follows; the applicant was employed at NCIS until 7 June 2021. There was no evidence that applicant’s security profile changed since then. There was also no allegation that the security certificate that must have been issued in order to enable his employment with NCIS in the first place had been withdrawn in terms of section 8(3) of the Act.

In terms of section 8(3) of the Act, the Director may withdraw such certificate only on the basis of a reasonable opinion that a staff member may be a security risk, but this was not the case in casu. Therefore, the Director was obliged to issue the required security certificate in order to enable the applicant’s reinstatement.

Even if it could be assumed that the applicant’s security certificate lapsed by operation of law due to his dismissal, it was contended on behalf of the applicant that it should be taken to have been resurrected when that dismissal was declared unlawful.

Shivute v President of the Republic of Namibia NAHCMD 8 September 2022 – Security certificate