Madibeng reacts over allegations that pension funds are in arrears
The Madibeng Municipality reacted strongly in the past week after the Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA) warned employees that they may not be able to withdraw funds from their pension funds under the new two-pot system, listing employers, among them Madibeng, who did not pay over contributions to pension funds.
The list of names of defaulting employers was published by the FSCA earlier this year.
The Madibeng Municipality disputed the FSCA’s statement, saying that legal action would be taken if the FSCA did not retract the information and publicly apologise.
This follows the FSCA nationwide Know Your Rights campaign that lists employers who defaulted in paying over pension fund contributions. This was reported in newspapers.
“We would like to refute the content of news articles published recently. Madibeng Municipality is identified as one of the 166 employers that are in arrears with pension fund payments. The Municipality wants to state that the information is false and misleading as all pension fund payments are up to date with no arrears,” said municipal spokesperson Tumelo Tshabalala.
He said all the municipal pension funds used by the municipality have confirmed that all contributions are up to date.
“We will engage with FSCA and demand a retraction of this deplorable information as well as a public apology. Failure of this will result in a legal route,” he said.
“We appeal to our employees not to panic as the information that was published is nothing but a fallacy. Anyone who wants to withdraw funds through the two-pot system should approach the relevant department for assistance,” said acting municipal manager Walter Phala.