Bloemfontein – A retired employee of the Masilonyana local municipality in the Free State has been forced to go hungry after he found that the ANC-run municipality did not pay his pension fund deductions.
Israel Mogoaladi, now aged 70, retired in September 2018 and when he applied to the National Fund for Municipal Workers which handles pensions for municipal employees, he found that the deductions were not paid by the municipality as required by the law.
NEWS: A retired municipal employee of the Masilonyana local municipality in the Free State province has been forced to go hungry after he found that the ANC-run municipality did not pay his pension fund deductions as required by the law.
— Sihle Mavuso (@ZANewsFlash) January 3, 2023
Mogoaladi said he learnt that he was not the first employee from the municipality to encounter the challenge.
He has now been forced to drive local taxis just to be able to pay bills while his lawyers are fighting to get the money from the municipality.
Masilonyana local municipality encompasses the Free State towns of Theunissen, Brandfort, Winburg, Soutpan and Verkeerdevlei and it is part of the Lejweleputswa District Municipality in the south of Bloemfontein.
“The fact of the matter is that they did deductions from my payslip but never transferred the money from the third-party national municipal workers pension funds.
“They even don’t have proof of payments.
“They even failed to bring those documents to court after they were served with court orders; they don’t comply they always miss court hearings,” Mogoaladi told IOL.
He shared a batch of documents proving his case against the ANC-run local municipality.
Among them is a letter written by his lawyers, Neumann Van Rooyen Attorneys to the municipality asking it to furnish them with documents as ruled by the courts.
The letter was sent out in November last year to the municipal manager, Sipho Thomas and it was never responded to.
“We hereby confirm that in terms of the court order issued, the defendant (Masilonyana) should have provided the necessary documents requested on or before November 1, 2022.
“According to Mr FB Cotzee Attorneys, no such document has been provided and the matter was postponed to November 8, 2022 in order to ensure that the respondents file the necessary documents.
“No documents were filed, and it was arranged for the matter to be postponed to December 1, 2022 for the necessary documents to be filed,” reads one legal letter.
It has been confirmed that even in the new year, the municipality has still not filed the requested court papers.
“Note this matter started in 2018 September, they have been dragging the matter through this manner.
“I am now suffering because of their actions, I am starving in front of them doing unlawful taxi operator (business) so that I can put food on the table,” Mogoaladi lamented.
Several attempts by IOL which started in November last year to get a comment from the municipality and the municipal manager yielded no results.
Calls, WhatsApp messages and emails were ignored by Thomas and his municipal communication team.
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