A chartered quantity surveyor who told colleagues their firm had HIV but he would ‘stop it becoming full blown AIDS’ has been left with a £10,000 bill after losing an employment tribunal.
Geoffrey Mada claimed that he was hired by Kent County Council to save Gen2 Properties. He acted as a bull in the china shop.
He made several comments which offended colleagues with ‘highly descriptive, colourful and in the circumstances, insensitive words’, the tribunal heard.
Madawho referred to himself as ‘John Wayne, Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible’ and ‘the new sheriff in town’ but was only employed for seven days until he suddenly resigned following criticism of his conduct.
He then launched a claim of racial discrimination and harassment saying the firm had only employed him because it was ‘easier to get a black person to do the dirty work’, but this was dismissed by the tribunal.
Now a follow up hearing has ruled he must pay £9,958 to contribute towards the legal costs of his former firm.
Madawho is an experienced quantity surveyor chartered from Nigeria, with over 20 years’ experience in the construction sector.
He was appointed as Associate Quantity Surveyor, a senior management position at the Maidstone office with a salary of £83,000 per annum.
Kent County Council owned the company for which he worked. The Kent County Council HQ can be pictured here
He had been there only seven days when his employment was abruptly terminated in June 2019. Although he claimed that his African ethnicity was the reason he was terminated, the tribunal found that he had left on his own accord.
The tribunal held in Croydon, London heard Mr Madawho was ‘rude and abrupt with staff, that he upset the team and failed to show leadership and diplomacy; essentially from the start of employment he was like ‘a bull in a china shop”.
He told the tribunal he felt like ‘John Wayne’, and also likened himself to ‘Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible’.
He said ‘I want to hit the ground running no parachute’, that he was passionate about being a chartered surveyor and thought he had found a company which had appreciated that.
With two or three days of his employment, members of staff told bosses they were worried by Mr Madawho’s reference to him being there to deal with the ‘mess’ the company was in and he had said he ‘was the new sheriff in town’.
The complaints were that his manner was ‘bullish, rude or aggressive’.
On one occasion he likened the company to having HIV and claimed he had been ‘brought in to stop it before it became full blown AIDS’
When he was asked by Head of Projects Joanne Taylor about ‘toning down his approach to staff’, she mentioned she had been working there since 2001.
He heralded his arrival at Kent County Council-owned Gen2 Properties by declaring there was a ‘new sheriff in town’.
He then commented: “You’ve been in post a very long time. In fact, I was sucking on my mum’s tits still when you must have started here.”
When Ms Taylor was affronted by the comment he replied that he was sorry if his language had upset her, ‘but that it was our culture and this is how we speak’.
At a senior management meeting on Friday 31st May 2019 Executive Chairman Paul Jones saw Mr Madawho’s interaction with the team, with whom he was abrupt and told them how they had been doing things wrong.
After the meeting he asked Mr Madawho to ‘tone things down’ with members of staff.
Employment Judge Anita Richardson said Mr Jones ‘had to act’ after hearing Mr Madawho had so upset a colleague she was crying and said she wanted to resign.
He added: “He needed to tell [Mr Madawho] he was going about the things the wrong way.”
Mr Jones called a meeting later that day where he again told Mr Madawho about things he needed to improve on but Mr Madawho quit, saying: “I knew you were going to sack me, so I’m going to resign.”
While Mr Madawho had claimed he was sacked because of his race, the judge said: “There is nothing racist in Mr Jones’s conduct.
“It was the conduct of a concerned manager dealing with a newly recruited senior manager who seemed to have completely misunderstood his role and the appropriate way to lead his new team.
“Mr Jones would have treated in exactly the same way another recruit to the same post, holding the same qualifications and experience as the claimant, being similar to the claimant in all respects except for being white, and who had acted in the same way as the claimant.”
Mr Madawho told the tribunal he had been recruited to do Mr Jones’s ‘dirty work’ and that he was the ‘fall guy’ and Mr Jones ‘would not be able to do it, he got me to do it, dirty Harry, Mission impossible’.
He also said: “Because white people aren’t treated so unfavourable – it’s easier to get a black person to do the dirty work and so I was the fall guy.”
But the judge concluded this ‘was an example of him acting out what he has heard in TV court room dramas and lacks any credibility’.
His claims of discrimination in race and harassment, and his claims regarding wrongful dismissal or unlawful deductions from wages were dismissed by the tribunal in June.
A remedy hearing was held last month and Mr Madawho was ordered by Judge Richardson to pay £9,958 as a contribution to Gen2’s legal costs through the employment tribunal proceedings.