Transnet pension fund trustees near criminal

I READ in recent newspaper reports that the trustees of the two Transnet Pension Funds donated profits of these funds to the tune of R309 million to Transnet.

This borders on the criminal.

This is part of a total claim that is estimated to be between R60 billion and R100bn and is a result of numerous, and apparently fraudulent, transactions whose sole purpose appears to be to help the company and screw the pensioners

As I understand it, there are five trustees of these two funds, all of whom are former employees of the company.

All of them are legally obliged to look after the interests of the pensioners (and themselves).

It is unconscionable to think that they would vote in favour of such a motion, unless they are paid stooges of the company.

To put it in other terms: A friend gives you some money to invest and when, after a few years, he wants it back, you tell him, “Sorry my friend, I just donated it to a company that was generous to me.”

The claim of the pensioners, as a whole, exceeds Transnet’s annual turnover and it would be interesting to know how Transnet would settle a claim of this magnitude, which would put this company in the same category as SAA, E-toll, Eskom and most of the other enterprises that this government is mismanaging.

It is of great comfort to the pensioners that they have a legal team of unquestionable repute and experience, which resulted in the judge rejecting most of the objections of the defendants of this class action and gave the pensioners’ legal team two weeks to give answers to a few minor details that he needed clarification on.

One would hope that once this is done the judge will show empathy with the pensioners by ordering that this matter proceed with the urgency that it deserves.

This would give some hope to the remaining benefactors (more than 10 of them die every day) of these funds, that they will one day be given what is rightfully theirs. CARL HAMMERSEN

Westville