By Sihle Mavuso
Embattled KwaZulu-Natal Social Development MEC Mbali Shinga has launched an urgent court bid to stop the National Freedom Party (NFP) from removing her from the provincial legislature after the party upheld her expulsion.
Shinga filed papers in the KwaZulu-Natal Division of the High Court in Pietermaritzburg on Wednesday, seeking an interdict preventing the NFP from asking provincial legislature Speaker Nontembeko Boyce to declare her seat vacant and replace her with party president Ivan Barnes.
She also wants the court to order the NFP to retract any communication already sent to Boyce seeking her removal, pending the finalisation of the dispute over her expulsion.
Shinga told the court her application was urgent because, if she followed the normal court roll and procedures, it could take up to two years for the matter to be heard.
By then, she said, Barnes and other NFP leaders would have succeeded in removing her unfairly and without following proper internal processes.
The court application follows the NFP’s decision to uphold Shinga’s expulsion after an internal disciplinary process found her guilty of gross insubordination and misconduct.
The dispute has placed renewed pressure on KwaZulu-Natal’s Government of Provincial Unity, in which the NFP holds one seat but plays a potentially decisive role.
Shinga has cited Advocate Zweli Zakwe, who chaired the appeals tribunal that upheld her expulsion. She argues in her court papers that, under the NFP constitution, the final structure empowered to decide on expulsions is the party’s General National Congress, not the appeals tribunal.
She accused Zakwe of acting outside the party’s constitution and said his appointment as appeal chairperson was imposed on her.
“The third respondent (Zakwe) was imposed on me. The third respondent resorted to circuitous reasoning to find, without hearing my version on this point, that I had agreed to his appointment as the appeal chairman.
“Despite my legal team pointing out that I have not agreed to his appointment, and I could not have agreed to it, the third respondent resorted to bizarre reasoning that my attorneys should have delivered an affidavit disputing that I agreed to his appointment,” Shinga said in the court papers.
Giving the court the background to the dispute, Shinga said her troubles with the party began in May last year when the NFP instructed her to amend the provincial substitute list and place Barnes first on the reserve list.
She said this happened even though Barnes had been placed first on the party’s list of candidates for the National Assembly. The NFP, however, did not secure enough votes in the 2024 elections to win a seat in Parliament.
Shinga said tensions escalated after the MK Party tabled a motion of no confidence in KwaZulu-Natal Premier Thamsanqa Ntuli (IFP) in November last year. Ntuli leads the provincial Government of Provincial Unity, made up of the IFP, ANC, DA and NFP.
The motion was later debated in the legislature on 15 December 2025, when Ntuli survived the attempt to remove him.
According to Shinga, Barnes and the NFP’s national leadership instructed her to vote in favour of Ntuli’s removal. As the party’s provincial chairperson and sole MPL in the legislature, she said she asked for a meeting to understand the reasons for the instruction.
She said party leaders indicated they would attend the meeting, but failed to do so, leaving her with no option but to vote against the motion.
“It was at this meeting that I was hoping to raise the issue of the motion, the lack of reasons for supporting it and to constructively engage on it,” she said in the papers.
Shinga further told the court that, during the debate on the motion, she took the position that the NFP should be guided by principle rather than political convenience.
She said any motion against the premier should be based on his performance in office, not political noise or manoeuvring.
The outcome of the court application could determine whether Shinga remains the NFP’s only representative in the KwaZulu-Natal Legislature and whether she continues serving as Social Development MEC.
If her removal goes ahead, Barnes is expected to take up the NFP seat in the legislature, a move that could shift the balance of power in the province’s closely contested 80-seat legislature.
The court gave no order on the matter but directed all parties to exchange affidavits and other information until June 17, 2026.
The judge president would then set a date for the matter to be heard as an urgent opposed motion matter.
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