Cape Town - At almost the 11th hour before threatened court proceedings began, the finance ministry on Friday afternoon contacted the Public Servants Association (PSA) to request a meeting at 11:30 in Pretoria on Monday.
According to correspondence from the finance ministry, the meeting will discuss “concerns over investment of pension fund money”.
This is the first acknowledgment from the ministry that the issue of how government employee pension funds are being invested will be discussed with the union that has been “deeply concerned” about potential “looting” of pension funds.
The PSA wrote a series of letters, dating back to September last year, requesting that Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba, as the sole shareholder of the Public Investment Corporation (PIC), explain why no “beneficiary” (worker or union) representatives had been appointed to the PIC board.
Last month legal action was threatened when there was no response from the minister.
The PSA was prepared to go to court on Monday to take the matter up. “Now we will be going instead to meet the minister,” said PSA deputy general manager, Tahir Maepa.
The PSA has also requested that the PSA provide a full breakdown of various investments made in unlisted entities and which, the union fears, may have been made on the basis of political, rather than financial considerations.
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