Workers want money back from Gupta-linked firms

Nearly half a billion rand in retirement funds belonging to thousands of Transnet workers landed up in the bank accounts of Gupta-linked companies, including a Bank of Baroda account, and the funds are believed to have been used to buy Optimum Coal Mine. So says a Sunday Times report, which notes the employees’ pension fund has approached the courts in a bid to force Gupta-linked Trillian and its director, Eric Wood – and other companies – to repay more than R300m, plus interest, it says it is owed. The report notes the Transnet Second Defined Benefit Fund, which has 51 000 members, is the first state-linked institution to take legal action against Gupta associates. The Transnet employees’ pension fund is taking Wood, alongside Regiments Capital and its directors, Litha Nyhonyha and Niven Pillay, to court. Kuben Moodley, a Gupta associate and former special adviser to Mineral Resources Minister Mosebenzi Zwane, and his company, Albatime, are also cited as respondents in the case lodged at the Gauteng High Court (Johannesburg).