The Road Accident Fund (RAF) said on Wednesday night that it had been granted an interdict by the labour court against the planned strike by the National Union of Metalworkers on SA (Numsa).
“The strike is therefore unprotected and unlawful. The RAF will exercise its rights against anyone who participates in the unlawful strike. Numsa communicated its intention to strike on Thursday, citing a list of grievances against the RAF and the CEO,” said RAF corporate communications head McIntosh Polela, in a statement issued at 8.11pm on Wednesday.
This was after Numsa said it would embark on a “national shutdown” of all RAF offices on Thursday, to demand the removal of CEO Collins Letsoalo for alleged “gross incompetence” and presiding over the “disastrous” state of affairs at the state-owned entity.
At 11.09pm on Wednesday, Numsa general secretary Irvin Jim said: “We are calling on workers to observe the interdict because we do not want them to suffer victimisation through disciplinary action and possible dismissal. We know most of our members are disappointed; however, we urge them to comply with the order.”
He said the union was “not properly served with papers and was denied the opportunity to state its case. We will do whatever is necessary to fight back against RAF for attempting to undermine the constitutional right to strike”.
“The interdict will not stop us from continuing to expose the rot at RAF and the gross mismanagement of the CEO, Collins Letsoalo. We urge our officials and shop stewards to do everything possible to communicate to all workers that the strike has been interdicted,” Jim said.
The RAF is among state organs hollowed out by years of mismanagement, huge backlogs and corruption. The fund handles almost 100,000 claims each year and is subjected to, almost daily, fraudulent and overinflated claims.
In 2005, the RAF — which was set up in 1996 to compensate victims of traffic accidents — faced 185,773 claims, incurring legal expenses of R941m. By 2018, with a reduced number of claims of 92,101, legal costs skyrocketed to R8.8bn and reached R10.6bn in 2019.
In November 2023, the Special Investigating Unit announced it had recovered more than R317m the fund paid to lawyers erroneously, and was also investigating claims that the RAF lost millions more to maladministration and corruption.
The total amount of default judgments issued against the RAF for cost and fees from 2018 until the second quarter of 2023 amounts to R4.7bn.
In December, transport minister Sindisiwe Chikunga called on the RAF and auditor-general Tsakani Maluleke to reach an “amicable” out of court solution to their “technical accounting dispute”.
At the heart of the dispute between the RAF and the auditor-general was the fund’s controversial decision to adopt new accounting standards, which the auditor-general said had resulted in it understating its liabilities by about R300bn compared with the previous year.
Numsa general secretary Irvin Jim said the fund had been served with a 48-hour strike notice and was mobilising members for a shutdown on Thursday. The union is expected to hand over a memorandum of demands to Chikunga “listing all the problems at the organisation”.
“We are demanding that RAF CEO Collins Letsoalo be removed because of the disastrous state of the entity. The RAF is a public entity whose core function is to compensate victims of road accidents.
He claimed the fund outsourced critical operations, including the call centre, to private companies for hundreds of millions of rand; RAF violated the Protection of Personal Information Act because “personal information is in the hands of a third party”; and there was an “unbearable backlog of unprocessed RAF claims” due to a lack of claims handlers.
The union leader said at least 200 claims handlers have remained on suspension since 2022 when they were accused of fraud by the management with “no disciplinary action against them”.
The RAF intended to retrench workers because it had procured an automated system that cost more than R900m, which would make claims handlers and claims admin assistants obsolete, said Jim.
“Even now, the failure by the RAF to pay out claimants on time means that the assets of the institution are routinely attached by sheriffs of the court, so that they can be sold to pay monies owed. As a result, desks, chairs and office equipment is attached. Workers sit on boxes or on the floor when doing their work, because there are no desks or chairs,” he said.
Polela said: “The RAF has seen the allegations from Numsa, we disagree with them. We also disagree with their intention to strike. An attack on the CEO is unfortunate and unwarranted. The RAF is not a one man show, it’s an organisation. It is therefore disingenuous to attack one person, Collins Letsoalo.”
Polela said the changes “taking place are part of the 2020-2025 strategy to turn around the RAF. These changes were approved at the level of the board and shareholder, the department of transport. The strategy that led to the current changes including restructuring was presented to Numsa in the presence of the union leader, Irvin Jim.
“It was agreed between Numsa and the RAF that matters of discipline are not collective bargaining matters, but rather managerial prerogative. Disagreements in the workplace happen all the time. Management will continue to do its work, and likewise Numsa will continue to carry out its duties of protecting workers,” said Polela.
Update: March 13 2024
This article has been updated with new information.
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