Former president of the South African Medical Research Council and current University of Cape Town (UCT) council member Professor Glenda Gray has lodged a complaint against two fellow council members for allegedly violating UCT’s code of conduct.
News24 reports that the complaint is apparently linked to the withdrawal of funding from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and USAID earlier this year, and tied to two resolutions adopted by UCT’s council.
The complaint was lodged against Advocates Kessler Perumalsamy and Mark Oppenheimer in March.
Perumalsamy told News24 the allegations were “completely untrue and without merit”, while Oppenheimer described them as “false and outrageous”.
Gray has declined to comment on the complaint, but an insider said the problem started after UCT and other universities lost funding from the NIH and USAID earlier this year.
“Glenda said at the time that we must not create fear-mongering, which did not go down well with some council members,” said the insider, who added that UCT’s financial losses were blamed on the council’s adoption of two resolutions on the Gaza conflict in June 2024.
The first resolution that was passed repeated a call for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, the passage of humanitarian aid and the return of all captives, while the second stated that no UCT academic may enter into relations, or continue relations with, any research group and/or network whose author affiliations are with the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), and/or the broader Israeli military establishment.
The source said there was a complaint from Gray and counter-complaints.
Ventilated prematurely
Gray told News24 that she respected the internal process, which makes provision for an investigation “that allows both the complainant and those complained against a fair hearing”.
“This investigation should be carried out as per UCT processes and should not be ventilated prematurely in the public domain. Everybody should respect that. Their readiness to ventilate this in public astounds me.”
Meanwhile, Perumalsamy said the clear implication of Gray’s allegation was verbal assault.
“I have a tremendous amount of respect for Glenda and the work she does, and I won’t say anything uncharitable about her, but the allegations are unfortunate and untrue, and they arise because the council is conflicted about governance issues… Glenda and I have parted ways in how we understand the council’s role in upholding governance.”
He said that in a council meeting before Gray’s complaint, the council had considered funding risks to the university and that there was a real risk that it would continue to lose money – specifically the funding support from the US – because of the resolutions that it had taken.
“In the course of the council’s deliberations, Glenda remarked that that was fear-mongering.
“In the next council meeting (15 March), those risks had materialised. The vice-chancellor had presented his report, and it showed that the university did lose and will lose money from United States funding and NIH grants, among other things.
“I called Glenda out in council about that. I said her advice was wrong. She had said it was fear-mongering. It clearly was not. I think that embarrassed her.”
He said he did not want to “badmouth” Gray.
“The complaint against me is unfortunate, and I think it’s symptomatic of a larger governance crisis in the university.”
Perumalsamy said the investigation into the complaint had not started.
Confidential
Oppenheimer said the council meetings “are generally considered confidential”.
“However, considering Gray’s complaint becoming public, I have no choice but to respond publicly. She has indeed laid a complaint against me for an alleged verbal assault.
“This is one of several complaints council members have laid against each other. It is unfortunate that the UCT council finds itself so deeply divided.”
He said he would not discuss who else had been complained about, for confidentiality reasons.
“However, I must state that the allegations of verbal harassment are false and outrageous.”
Oppenheimer said the complaint arose after an exchange between him and Gray during the council meeting lunch break on 15 March.
“I reminded her that, in a prior council meeting, she had said there would be no financial benefit for UCT if it rescinded the anti-Israel resolutions it had previously adopted.
“She further claimed that concerns about funding drying up due to the resolutions were scaremongering.”
He said the resolutions prohibited UCT from undertaking research collaborations with Israeli academics affiliated with the IDF and replaced the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of anti-Semitism with the Jerusalem Declaration.
“At that council meeting, the vice-chancellor made it clear that the university could, in fact, lose hundreds of millions of rands from a donor contract with the Donald Gordon Foundation, that further donor withdrawals were likely, and that the American government could reconsider hundreds of millions in National Institutes of Health support if the resolutions were not rescinded.”
He said he told Gray her earlier assertion – that worrying about the financial consequences of the resolutions for UCT was “scaremongering” – was nonsense, considering the reality.
“It is disappointing that she would interpret this exchange of ideas as verbal harassment. The complaint is unbecoming of someone of her stature.”
UCT spokesperson Elijah Moholola said council discussions and engagements were confidential.
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