(a) in the case of a MEMBER who retires in of Rule 3.4 (1) (a) or 3.4 (1)(d) above, such PENSION shall be increased by- (i) one-third of the period of the MEMBER'S PENSIONABLE SERVICE; or the period between the date on the MEMBER so retires and the date on which the MEMBER would have attained the NORMAL RETIREMENT AGE; or a period of five years, whichever is the shortest;’. The relevant events and correspondence [5] In October 2009 the board of the applicant decided to declare its internal audit unit where the second and third respondents were employed redundant. [6] On 3 November 2009 (according to the date stamp on the relevant documents) the applicant’s senior manager for human resources, Mr Hamwele, completed a ‘request for quotation’ form in respect of the second respondent to request the first respondent to provide a quotation of the second respondent’s pension benefits. The form makes provision for the type of quotation to be indicated. The pre-printed options on the form are: ‘Resignation Cash’, ‘Resignation Transfer’, ‘Normal Retirement’, ‘Early Retirement’, ‘Ill-health Retirement’, ‘Disability Retirement’ and ‘Other’. Next to the word ‘Other’ the words ‘Redundancy/Retrenchment’ were inserted. On the same date the applicant’s human capital officer, Ms Iyambo, completed the same form in respect of the third respondent. The type of quotation requested was for ‘Retrenchment’. On both forms the last working date was indicated to be 31 December 2009. [7] On 12 November 2009 the applicant’s manager director addressed a letter (hereinafter ‘the redundancy letter’) to each of the second and third respondents. The relevant part of the letter reads as follows:
[38] In light of this submission it is necessary to examine in more detail the specific averments made and the responses thereto in the second and third respondents’ answering affidavits. (i) Paragraph 20 of the founding affidavit [39] The first averment is contained in paragraph 20 of the founding affidavit and it is that the applicant withdrew the retrenchment offer before the retrenchment packages were finalised or the retrenchments were implemented. Having referred to this averment, counsels’ further submission, as set out in paragraph 14.3 of the applicant’s heads of argument, is that the alleged bald denials are made – ‘despite the finding of the arbitrator based on, inter alia, the evidence of Christoph referred to at page 3 of the award: “According to them (the employees) everything went well and an understanding was reached on a number of aspects of the packages until when it later emerged that the respondent had to make some substantive payment to the pension fund as part of the retrenchment exercise. According to the applicants it was only at this juncture that respondent made a u-turn and attempted to remove the second option which they have already opted for.” ‘ [40] I pause to note that counsel’s submission must be considered based on the assumption that what is termed ‘the retrenchment offer’ is referred to by the arbitrator as ‘the second option’. Using for the moment the terms used in the founding affidavit, it is, in my view, of importance to note here that the arbitrator did not find that the retrenchment offer was withdrawn, only that there was an attempt to withdraw the offer which had already been accepted. [41] The second respondent’s answer to the allegation in paragraph 20 of the founding affidavit is set out in paragraph 29 of his answering affidavit as follows: ’29.