Rössing surplus seekers want help from LaRRI

THE Forum of Concerned Members of the Rössing Pension Fund (RPF), who believe they have a claim to the fund’s estimated N$650 million surplus, have turned to the Labour Resource and Research Institute (LaRRI) to assist them.

‘Since our members’ efforts to resolve this matter in an amicable manner are being met with intransigence, we have resolved to employ other mechanisms to ensure that our experiences and the historic facts relating to the pension fund administration are objectively recorded,’ said the forum’s Chairman, Winston Groenewald, in a letter to Rössing Uranium’s Managing Director, Mike Leach.
Groenewald said Rössing’s response to a petition handed over to the mine on August 4 ‘did not clarify, neither address, the historic facts’ brought up by the forum.
The petition demanded an ‘equitable and fair’ share in the surplus.
It referred to ‘racial inequalities’ in salary structures, allegedly affecting the monetary value of pensions; the introduction of a contribution holiday in 1992; and a claim of N$210 million share in the surplus by the mine’s management to allegedly guarantee the employer exemption from future pension fund contributions.
Rössing’s response was that it supported the fair treatment of all interested and affected parties pertaining to the surplus, as long as it was done in line with the provisions of the law.
It said Namfisa was currently reviewing the relevant act.
It said there was no provision in the existing law for a pension fund surplus to be distributed in cash, and that the law only recognised current members and pensioners.
In the letter from the forum, which was delivered to Rössing last week, Groenewald said LaRRI was approached as an independent research organisation that was concerned with economic justice in the workplace, and the eradication of abuse and exploitation.
‘We kindly request that [Rössing] fully co-operate and put [their] case and arguments to LaRRI so the facts of both sides could be recorded and assessed in an objective manner,’ he concluded.