No easy fix: Road Accident Fund pleads with Parliament over broken funding model

The board of the Road Accident Fund (RAF) said that it had no idea how to fix the organisation’s solvency problems.

In a frank exchange with the Standing Committee On Public Accounts (SCOPA) on Tuesday, interim board chairperson Kenneth Brown said he did not believe raising the fuel levy was the answer.

The funding model of the beleaguered organisation was among a number of issues probed by SCOPA during its inquiry into maladministration at the fund.

While the board was unable to give a definitive figure on the extent of the RAF’s liabilities, indications were that it stood at around R100 billion at the end of the last quarter in December.

Chairperson of the audit and risk committee, Ntina Themba, appealed to Parliament to help rethink the funding model for the organisation.

Themba said: "If we fix the systems, can we get you helping us to say how do we then get the money? But we cannot stop the claims coming."

Asked what the board was proposing to turn the situation around, Themba admitted there was currently no clear path forward.

"There’s no solution. I don’t even want to lie. If anyone can come and sit here and tell us there’s a solution."

Brown added that there was a mismatch between the contributions made to the fund through the fuel levy and the benefits it was paying to road accident victims.