Gareth Cliff is coming across as a little desperate, wouldn’t you say? Unless this is all a ploy to get M-Net back in one way or another for firing him over his freedom of speech tweet. After M-Net failed to reply to his letter demanding them to provisionally reinstate him as a judge on Idols, his legal representatives lodged an application to reinstate him at the High Court in Johannesburg this morning.

M-Net has until 10:00 tomorrow morning to oppose the application and till Thursday file their answering papers.

The matter is set to be heard in court on 26 January:

We are saying to court, pending the determination of the R25m playing, this is what you must do as court: you must reinstate him. Two years from now, Idols will be finished. That is why we are going to court now.

If a judge decides that Cliff shall not be reinstated, the second part of the order is to halt Idols. The first set of audition is set to go ahead only four days after the court case.

However, M-Net is so unconcerned with the threats:

At this point nothing has changed in the Idols schedule.

[source: channel24]