Former security guards who battled for years to access their hard-earned pension funds have scored a major legal victory after the Johannesburg High Court dismissed a last-ditch attempt by Mafoko Security Patrols to challenge the process.
The ruling, delivered by Acting Judge Jonathan Berger, ensures that the affected employees will finally receive the funds owed to them after Mafoko’s repeated failure to pay contributions to the Private Security Sector Provident Fund.
The case involved former employees who had been left in limbo after Mafoko ignored rulings by the Pension Funds Adjudicator (PFA) that found the company in breach of its legal obligations.
Despite clear determinations that the company owed pension contributions, Mafoko tried to block enforcement by challenging the calculations, an argument that the court dismissed outright.
“At the heart of each application was Mafoko’s repeated failure, in some cases over years, to pay contributions due on behalf of an employee to the fund,” Berger ruled, making it clear that the security company had failed its former workers.
The ruling brings relief to security guards who feared they would never receive the money that was deducted from their salaries but never paid into the pension fund. Some had waited years after leaving Mafoko, only to be met with silence when they tried to claim funds.
In each case, the former employees had turned to the PFA, which directed Mafoko to resolve the issue with the Private Security Sector Provident Fund. However, the company ignored the process, forcing the workers to seek writs of execution, which are court orders that allowed them to recover the money by legal force.
It was only at this stage that Mafoko reacted, rushing to court in a bid to halt the process.
Berger dismissed the company’s actions as a delay tactic, making it clear that the court would not allow justice to be postponed any longer.
Mafoko Security Patrols’ biggest fear, as outlined by its director Lebo Tlare-Nare in her founding papers, was that if the method used to calculate pension arrears in the cases before the court was applied across its entire workforce of 11 000, the company could face a financial catastrophe.
Tlare-Nare stressed that Mafoko was responsible for deducting and paying pension contributions for each employee, and if the same disputed calculations were replicated on a larger scale, it could trigger a flood of claims that would have a devastating financial impact on it.
During the hearing, Mafoko’s lawyer, Adv Isiah Mureriwa, argued that the amounts on the writs of execution were incorrect and that Mafoko had been excluded from the calculation process.
However, the judge was not convinced, pointing out that the company had every opportunity to challenge the figures earlier but chose to remain silent.
When it became clear that the court was not swayed by its argument, Mafoko made a sudden U-turn and attempted to withdraw the cases altogether, citing an intention to “amend the papers”.
But the respondents’ legal team, representing the former employees, refused to consent, forcing the court to proceed.
Berger was critical of Mafoko’s conduct, stating that allowing the withdrawal of the cases before him would be “making it more difficult for the systemic problems to be resolved”.
He further noted that Mafoko had wasted judicial resources and failed to take steps to properly resolve the dispute.
“Mafoko’s failure to participate in the proceedings before the PFA, and its failure after securing interim interdictory relief to take any steps to get part B of each review set down for hearing, strongly suggests that it is in no hurry to have its former employees’ complaints resolved.”
The judge dismissed Mafoko’s application and ordered the company to pay the legal costs of the former employees.
He also confirmed that the pension fund’s determinations would stand, meaning the workers would now be able to claim the money owed to them.
“The application is dismissed. The applicant is directed to pay the first respondent’s costs, including the costs of counsel,” Berger ruled.
