Scheme gets trademark, R10m back

Ilse de Lange

Medical scheme Medshield has obtained a court order setting aside an unnecessary R10 million transaction the scheme’s former curator concluded to buy the Medshield trademark.

Acting Judge M Senyatsi in the High Court in Pretoria not only set aside the transaction, but ordered Alumni Trading 264 to repay R10 million to the scheme.

Alumni, which has a close relationship with Medshield Brokers and Medshield Distribution Ser- vices, which formerly did business with the medical schemes, registered the Medshield trademark in 2011, but never used it.

It sold the trademark to the scheme after the cancellation of contracts worth several millions of rands between the scheme and Medshield Brokers and Medshield Distribution Services.

The agreement was concluded after negotiations between the medical scheme’s former curator, Themba Langa, and Alumni director Jan le Roux, who is also a director of the two companies whose contracts were cancelled.

Langa, who resigned as curator in 2014, opposed Medshield’s application, which was initiated by his successor, Tebogo Phaleng.

The scheme alleged the R10 million transaction was “tainted by illegality, corruption and fraud”, which Langa and Alumni strenuously denied. Langa said there was nothing wrong with his conduct and buying the trademark had been appropriate.

Senyatsi found there was no need to buy the trademark and that the sale had been actuated by bad faith, although he was not persuaded fraud was involved.