Pardon means struggle veteran can receive special pension, court says

Ninety-two-year-old struggle activist Nathaniel Mashilo Masemola must receive a special pension, the constitutional court ruled on Tuesday.

Masemola, who was actively engaged in the ANC's liberation battle, lost his special pension after a fraud conviction. He received a pardon from former president Jacob Zuma on July 21 2011.

The constitutional court ordered that the pension be reinstated because of the pardon.

The question facing the court was whether a pardoned individual was entitled to the restoration of the special pension if they had been previously disqualified because of a criminal conviction.

The matter has its origins as far back as 1997, when Masemola, an ANC member since 1946, applied for and was awarded a special pension in respect of his sacrifices and his service in the public interest.

However, Masemola was convicted of several counts of fraud and sentenced to five years’ imprisonment in 2001. He served six months.

Masemola continued to draw his special pension until he received a letter from the Special Pensions Appeal Board in 2008. It stated that, because he had been convicted of fraud, the Special Pensions Act disqualified him from receiving the remuneration.

His pension was stopped in June 2008.

After being pardoned, Masemola approached the Government Pensions Administration Agency (GPAA) for the reinstatement of the pension.

This was refused by the GPAA, which said the pardon did not invalidate decisions taken before the granting of the pardon.

Masemola then approached the high court in Pretoria, which ordered the reinstatement of his pension.

However, the Supreme Court of Appeal upheld an appeal by the Special Pensions Appeal Board and the GPAA, and held that Masemola was no longer entitled to receive the benefit.

This led him to approach the constitutional court.

In a unanimous judgment by Justice Nonkosi Mhlantla, the court said the result of the presidential pardon was that Masemola, for all intents and purposes, and with effect from July 21 2011, was legally to be treated as a person who had not been convicted of an offence.

Mhlantla said Masemola sought the reinstatement of his special pension only from the date he was pardoned.

“He acknowledges he was disqualified from receiving his special pension under the act between April 2001 and his pardon in July 2011. But, he says, his entitlement to the special pension revived when he was pardoned,” the judgment read.

The court said the appropriate relief was to declare that Masemola’s entitlement to receive a special pension was restored from the date of his pardon

The court ordered that the Special Pensions Appeal Board and the GPAA pay Masemola the money within 14 days.