Pensioners are the biggest losers in PIC fiasco
Does a fish really rot from the head? For years, pensioners did not believe this to be the case at the Public Investment Corporation (PIC), because maladministration appeared to be widespread throughout the organisation. Failed investments, enormous write-offs and questionable decisions occurred at every level.
Now, however, the crisis has finally reached the very top (“New PIC board marks ‘crucial step in restoring stability’”, July 30).
The public has become so accustomed to reports of misconduct at the PIC that they scarcely make headlines anymore. This time, though, the situation is markedly different. Senior executives have been suspended, while the chair and six board members have resigned. The institution has in effect suffered a collapse in governance.
Many pensioners hoped that would finally result in their retirement savings being placed beyond political interference. They overlooked one reality: the ANC is unlikely to surrender control of an institution that manages more than R3-trillion in public assets.
The Mpati commission recommended six years ago that politics should be removed from the governance of the PIC, yet that recommendation remains unimplemented. Instead, another political appointment was made when the law required a deputy minister to be appointed chair. The other deputy finance minister, Ashor Sarupen, was eligible for the position, but his membership of the DA evidently made his appointment politically unacceptable to the ANC.
The solution is straightforward: the PIC Act should be amended to require the appointment of an appropriately qualified, independent, nonpolitical chair. There is no sound reason why the Government Employees Pension Fund (GEPF) should be treated differently from other pension funds. The assets belong to its members and pensioners, not to the state.
Only now, six years after describing the Mpati commission’s 377 recommendations as urgent, has the president once again instructed that they be implemented. Many pensioners will ask why it has taken so long.
Equally remarkable is Cosatu’s sudden demand that all PIC investments be reviewed. Until recently it supported the use of pension fund assets for state projects. What has changed? Is this genuine concern, or simply a response to the political realities ahead of the next election?
It is worth remembering that, through the tripartite alliance, Cosatu has considerable influence over the appointment of 11 of the 16 trustees on the GEPF board. That majority inevitably raises questions about the independence of governance and whose interests are ultimately being protected.
Adamus P Stemmet
Ridgeworth
Bitcoin scam exposes systemic failures
It is gratifying to see that Ike Boss has had three letters published in recent weeks.
His comments on online gambling were on point. “Winners know when to stop” is a fabrication, and the press at large, and the Press Council of South Africa in particular, should be ashamed at allowing advertisers to use it.
Boss’s most recent letter hit a note I can echo (“Regulators fail to halt rapid money laundering after phishing scam”, August 12). Had he known about it, he could have also put before parliament’s standing committee the unlawful purchase of bitcoin, on a public holiday, using R358,000 of stolen funds.
All of the regulators — including the Financial Intelligence Centre, Reserve Bank, South African Revenue Service, Financial Sector Conduct Authority and the Financial Action Task Force — ignored the issue, and the police were hopeless, though they had no support from the bank concerned, whose Financial Intelligence Centre Act records were non-existent.
South Africa beware. The greylist could, and should, be coming back.
Chris Richards
Craighall Park
Religious certification does not impose on consumers
Daniel Jacobi’s letter (“Religious certification’s role in consumer choice”, July 6) refers.
The same principle should surely apply to kosher certification. South African consumers routinely purchase products bearing kosher symbols without being Jewish or having requested kosher compliance.
We generally understand that this does not impose Judaism upon those consumers; it simply makes the product accessible to Jewish consumers.
Halaal certification should be understood through precisely the same lens.
Yacoob Moosa
Via email
Political theatrics overshadow accountable leadership
South Africa enters an electoral year saturated with promises, declarations and theatrics. Yet as the contest intensifies, satire has become an unwitting participant in the campaign.
Political debates increasingly resemble an exercise in comedy, where grandiose rhetoric is paraded as an achievement, empty assurances are presented as solutions and political theatre substitutes for competent governance.
Our politicians appear detached from the harsh realities confronting ordinary citizens, yet the public is expected to applaud promises while unemployment, poverty, crime, failing infrastructure and institutional decay demand urgent action.
South Africa requires leaders capable of delivering measurable results, accepting responsibility and confronting failure without evasion or excuses.
The time for political illusion is rapidly expiring because citizens aren’t asking for fairy tales. They are demanding competent governance, integrity, accountability and results.
Farouk Araie
Benoni
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