Pretoria - The pension fund governing the pensions of about 75 000 Transnet pensioners is not empowered to award them more than a 2 percent annual increase despite the fact that many of the former SA Railways and Harbours and SAA workers claim they can no longer afford to put food on the table.
This is the response of the Transnet Second Defined Benefit Fund to an application by the pensioners, due to be heard by the Pretoria High Court.
The pensioners are planning to take on the government and their pension fund over the measly 2 percent annual increase they have received over nearly a decade. They want to take the government to task over its promises to make a cash injection of R1.9 billion into the fund.
They also want the court to declare the annual 2 percent increase unconstitutional and want an order forcing the fund to give pensioners an ex gratia payment of five months’ pension, a base upliftment of 3.21 percent, as well as a 75 percent of consumer price index annual increase.
Responding to these demands, Petrus Maritz, the principal officer of fund, said there were so many material disputes of fact between the parties that the matter could not be resolved in court papers.
Apart from this, read his statement filed with the court, the fund rules provided only for an annual increase of 2 percent.
Maritz said any amendment to that was likely to affect the financial condition of the fund. “No such rule amendment can be of any force or effect unless it has been approved by Transnet and the minister of public enterprise, acting with the concurrence of the minister of finance.”
Pensioner Gordon Thompson, who launched the application, said he wanted answers from the government as to why it was refusing to come to the aid of pensioners’ - many of whom were severely impoverished.
He said in papers that for more than a decade now, the fund refused to pay pensioners more than the yearly 2 percent increase. His pension grew from R7 125 in July 2002 to R8 515 in July 2011 - a growth of 19.5 percent over seven years. Over the same time inflation had risen by 64 percent.
Alexander Forbes Financial Services actuary Andre Pienaar said in an affidavit that the pensioners’ demand that the annual pension increase should be linked to inflation would have an immediate negative effect on the liabilities of the fund. He also said the change would affect the reserves of the fund and its ability to remain liquid in future.
Maritz said: “If such an increase were to occur, it is unlikely that the fund would remain in a sound financial position.”
He pointed out that the fund had made various ex gratia payments to the pensioners up to December last year. This had started off in 2007 with a bonus equal to 1.5 percent of annual pensions granted to all pensioners. During February last year pensioners received triple their monthly pensions and double during December the same year. However, these had been one-off payments, he said, as the fund had been in a positive financial position at the time.
One cash-strapped pensioner, Rudi Fouche, of Klerksdorp, stated that in January last year, he received only R1. There was only once deduction from his pension - his medical aid. For that month he received R4 269 as his pension, of which R4 268 was deducted for medial aid member fees.
A date for the application to be heard is yet to be determined.
Pretoria News