Dunedin councillor Benedict Ong doubles down on secret asset sale claims

Embattled Dunedin city councillor Benedict Ong was given a deadline and a warning to retract claims the city's forests were secretly being put up for sale or face a fourth code of conduct complaint.

Instead, he doubled down.

This was not unexpected, Ong previously told RNZ he would not remove them.

A few hours before the 5pm Wednesday deadline he made another social media post, adding audio of Crazy by Gnarls Barkley, alleging the possible sale of council-controlled asset City Forests.

A day earlier, Dunedin City Council chief executive Richard Briggs wrote to Ong, telling him the claims were false and he needed to take down the multiple social media posts and publish a correction.

The letter, which Ong sent to media shortly after receiving it, said he publicly alleged the mayor and other councillors colluded against the interests of the city with no evidence to support the claims.

Ong had also been given the correct information during a public meeting, but Briggs said he had instead harangued the speaker and continued to make untrue claims.

"He is entitled to be questioned hard. He is not entitled to be treated the way you treated him," he said.

Briggs said he wanted to give Ong the opportunity to avoid any further costs to ratepayers by going through a fourth code of conduct complaint

"You have been found in breach of the Code three times in the past year, most recently on 29 October, and are serving a nine-month suspension from committees as a result. A fourth finding, on posts made days after the third, will be considered in that light," Briggs said.

He also warned Ong could also face possible legal actions for some of his comments.

Ong previously told RNZ he stood by his posts.

In a Facebook post made minutes before the deadline, to the tune of Tragical Irony by Audio Attack, Ong claimed the code of conduct complaints were being weaponised against him.

He has previously claimed he had been subject to "false, malicious coordinated political attacks" since he was elected last October.

During that time, he has been trespassed from the University of Otago following students complaints, stood as an independent candidate in the Dunedin electorate, claimed he would never resign, and subsequently confirmed he would resign as councillor if he did not win the Dunedin electorate.

Last week, a third code of conduct breach was upheld after he was found to have materially breached the code in a public and deliberate manner.

He was suspended from all council committees and subcommittees for nine months until July 2027.

That was similar to the nine-month suspension he received in May after an investigation found he was likely deliberately and repeatedly leaking information that could potentially jeopardise the council's commercial interests.

He was asked to resign by his colleagues in March, offering a reading from Franz Kafka's novel The Trial.

He had been found to have accused a council staff member of apparent political bias and a lack of political neutrality in an email to the council's chief executive and local media.

In a statement to media, Richard Briggs said he would consider the next steps and, if required, would follow the standard code of conduct process in due course.

"Every Code of Conduct is treated individually," he said.

"No additional weight is considered when investigating repeated breaches of the Code. Each complaint is objectively assessed and investigated independently of the DCC.

"Based on the findings of the independent investigator, the elected members decide if there has been a material breach of the Code of Conduct and, if so, what (if any) penalty to impose from the list in the code of conduct.

"In deciding on a penalty, elected members can consider what penalties have been imposed previously."

Speculation about Ong's plans to resign after the general election would have no bearing on the decision but all elected members were made aware of the code when taking office, he said.

"Any decisions made in relation to that code are taken seriously."