Thousands of divorced government employees are in debt because of a ruling that gives their exes immediate access to their pensions. At least one policeman has been forced to moonlight because the interest-bearing debt is so crippling. Another policeman will need 65 years to clear his debt.The problem is a rule in the Government Employee Pension Fund. The rule, which the fund admits is prejudicial, was created in 2012 after an amendment to the Pension Fund Act. Known as the clean-break principle, the amendment grants former spouses of pension fund members immediate access to a portion of the pension as determined by a court.Before 2007 that amount could be accessed only after a pension fund member retired.It is believed that trustees of the Government Employee Pension Fund "tweaked" the rules around the principle, because the fund was losing millions in divorce-settlement payouts. The tweak makes fund members divorced after 2012 indebted to the fund for the payouts to their former spouses.Such members are warned that the debt will "accrue interest" at a rate equal to "repo plus 3 [percentage points]" and this will be compounded.In the event the debt is not "extinguished prior to a member exiting from the fund, it will be deducted, together with interest, from any pension benefit" payable to the member. If this is insufficient the member is directly responsible for repayment of the debt.Economist and pension fund experts have slammed the rule, claiming it can be challenged in court.A professor at the Wits School of Governance, Alex van der Heever, said fund members' benefits were being "obliterated".The South African Pension Fund Adjudicator, which has no jurisdiction over the government fund, says the Public Protector could be called on to become involved.To date, 1 200 members of the fund have been "dealt with" under the debt process.Documentation from the fund says its board has, after complaints that employees "ended up with no benefits", approved changes to the rule. But these require a legislative amendment before they can be implemented. "It is anticipated that this process would take about two years."Fund trustees failed to answer questions posed by The Times, including the total amount "owed" to the fund by divorced members was; whether members who divorce now will still be prejudiced with the debt; whether existing prejudiced members will be reimbursed should the rule change; whether affected members signed an acknowledgement of debt; and how many members had been left without pensions because of their debt to the fund.A Durban policeman, who asked not to be named, said the debt had financially crippled him. "My pension is gone. Every month they take money from my salary to pay for something that was originally mine."To repay this debt, which I never signed for, will take 784 months. By then I will be dead and my children reaching retirement."Van den Heever, chairman of security systems administration and management studies at the Wits School of Governance, said the rule was prejudicial to members and should be legally challenged as it deviated from the law. The rule was, by the fund's own admission, "unenforceable".He said debt could not be created without members having signed an acknowledgement of debt. "You cannot create a debt that someone knows nothing about, especially where the payback risks undermine the member's existing pension benefit. "Members are forced to pay for something they have not planned for, raising the real possibility of completely exhausting their benefits through this debt."He said it was difficult to establish how members were going into debt, when the payouts to their former spouses were from money they had accrued and that was effectively theirs."What the fund's administrators are doing is that, instead of adjusting the members' defined benefits to the new amount following the payout to members' former spouses, they are leaving it at the original defined benefit prior to a divorce."They then tell the members they are responsible for the shortfall . plus interest."A simple reconciliation should occur, with the benefits adjusted to the new amount, minus the divorce payout. "The interest and how it is calculated and by whom is worrying," Van den Heever saidJannie Rossouw, head of the Wits School of Economics and Business Sciences, said it was clear the fund had become seriously underfunded by the withdrawals through the court orders."By not lowering the defined benefits of divorced members, the trustees risked bankrupting the fund. It is clear they were between a rock and a hard place so they took this decision [to put the members in debt for the shortfall]."..