A senior Makana Municipality official narrowly escaped arrest on Friday afternoon when a warrant of arrest was issued to him.

Maud Ndwayana, the Makana Human Resources manager had to hand over money to his subordinate to settle the fine before he could drive away from where he was parked in front of the City Hall in High Street.

“I gave the HR practitioner the money to pay the fine on my behalf, I am law-abiding citizen,” Ndwayana told Grocott's Mail.

Makana Human Resoures practitioner Ntombi Peta drove with the traffic officer to pay the R500 fine at the traffic department.

Ndwayana was fined by traffic officer Terrence Bafo on 4 September 2009 for parking his black Corsa bakkie (Reg. No. CA 310969) in a disabled parking bay next to the Municipal Manager's parking bay.

However, he failed to pay the fine or to appear in court on 11 November as ordered. A warrant of arrest was then issued against him.

So when he emerged from his office on Friday at 1pm, Bafo and two police officers were patiently waiting for him near his car.

When he got to them the warrant of arrest was served to him. Instead of explaining to Grocott's Mail why he had not paid the fine yet, Ndwayana took a swipe at Bafo and accused him of abusing his profession due to differences between them.

“He has a pending case of misconduct emanating from his mischievous arrests,” he explained. “There are lots of complaints [from motorists] against him and he's costing the council a fortune in litigation expenses.”

Bafo, however, dismissed these allegations as baseless as there is no history of bad blood between them. “It's just that he thinks he's above the law, no one is above the law and the road is my  office,” he added.

Responding to allegations that his professional conduct was a liability to the council, he said that no court has found him guilty of any crime and that all the complaints against him were unfounded.