2
procure stolen goods. Mr. Riga’s particulars also suggest that the value of
Voltex’s inventory may have been deliberately overstated so as to enhance
Voltex’s reportable financial position. Mr. Riga says he reported the details of
these payments and accounting manoeuvres to Voltex’s executives, including
its managing director. As a result, he says, he was demoted and ultimately
dismissed, solely or predominantly for shedding light on these audit findings.
2 On 2 5 May 2023, Mr Riga instituted a claim against Voltex for breach of
contract in the form of wrongful dismissal. Aware of the common law rule that
damages for the breach of an employment contract do not generally exceed
two weeks’ salary, Mr. Riga initially asked that the common law rule be
developed under the Constitution, 1996, to allow him to claim what would have
been due to him had his employment with Voltex subsisted until retirement.
3 On 23 February 2024, however, Mr. Riga abandoned that claim, and
substituted it with the claim that his demotion and ultimate dismissal
constituted an occupational detriment under the Protected Disclosures Act 26
of 2000. Mr. Riga claimed that he had been subjected to this detriment solely
as a result of his reporting of his various audit findings, which constituted
protected disclosures under the Act. Because, Mr. Riga claimed, the Act
creates a statutory duty not to subject him to an occupational detriment merely
for making such disclosures, his demotion and dismissal were wrongful, and
he is entitled to be compensated by being placed in the position he would have
been in had he not been dismissed. The value of that claim is identical to the
claim Mr. Riga initially made for breach of his employment contract.
3
4 Voltex met this amendment with a special plea of prescription. It also pleaded
over in the event that the special plea failed. By agreement between the
parties, which was endorsed in an order of Manoim J dated 27 February 2025,
only the special plea is before me. The special plea was enrolled in my
opposed motion court for the week of 24 August 2026.
5 Voltex initially objected to the enrolment of the special plea in motion court,
but, at the hearing, Mr. Whitcutt, who appeared for Voltex, declined to press
that objection. That was wise. It is standard practice in this court for a special
plea to be enrolled as an opposed motion if both parties agree that the plea
may be determined on the face of the documents filed in the trial action. The
practice is meant to save the time that would otherwise be wasted by
separating a special plea from the remaining issues in a trial action and placing
the special plea on the trial roll, from which a hearing takes much longer to
materialise than from the opposed motion roll. The parties were agreed that
the special plea could be determined on the face of the pleadings as they
presently stand. The opposed motion court is clearly the correct forum to do
this.
6 Voltex says that Mr. Riga’s claim introduced on 23 February 2024 has
prescribed because it seeks payment of a debt substantially different from the
debt claimed in Mr. Riga’s particulars of claim dated 25 May 2023. However
Mr. Riga’s claim is to be characterised, the debt Mr. Riga says is due had to
be claimed by no later than three years from the day he was dismissed. Mr.
Riga served his 25 May 2023 particulars of claim well within this period, but
service of the 23 February 2024 particulars fell substantially beyond it. It
4
follows that, if the debt claimed in the 2024 particulars really is different from
the debt claimed in the 2023 particulars, Mr. Riga’s claim has indeed
prescribed, and the special plea must be sustained.
7 Whether the two sets of particulars refer to different debts depends on the
construction to be given to the word “debt” in the Prescription Act 68 of 1969.
Although the Act itself does not explicitly define the word “debt”, our courts
have consistently held that a “debt” is something different from a “cause of
action”. A cause of action “is the entire set of facts which gives rise to an
enforceable claim and includes every fact which is material to be proved to
entitle a plaintiff to succeed in his claim” (Abrahamse & Sons v SA Railways
and Harbours 1933 CPD 626, endorsed in Evins v Shield Insurance Co Ltd
1980 (2) SA 814 (A) (“ Evins”), 838G-H). To put it another way, a cause of
action is “every fact which it would be necessary for the plaintiff to prove, if
traversed, in order to support his right to judgment of the Court. It does not
comprise every piece of evidence which is necessary to prove each fact, but
every fact which is necessary to be proved” (McKenzie v Farmers' Co-
operative Meat Industries Ltd 1922 AD 16).
8 The authorities are less admirably clear about what constitutes a “debt”. In
Evins it was said that a “'debt' is necessarily the correlative of a right of action
vested in the creditor, which likewise becomes extinguished simultaneously
with the debt . . . Where a creditor has two rights, or causes, of action then
there are two corresponding debts. When it comes to the judicial interruption
of prescription . . . if the process seeks to enforce two debts (or causes of
action), it will only interrupt prescription in respect of both if it is effective as a
5
means of commencing legal proceedings in respect of both” (Evins, 842E-G).
On its face, this dictum ties the idea of a debt very closely to the concept of a
“cause of action”. A debt is merely the right to payment that would result if a
specific cause of action is made out. On Evins, it follows, I think, that if an
amendment substitutes one cause of action for another, then it also
substitutes one debt for another.
9 Other decisions have been more forgiving. In CGU Insurance v Rumdel
Construction (Pty Ltd 2004 (2) SA 622 (SCA), the court took a looser
approach. There, it was said that the word “debt” in the Prescription Act must
bear a “wide and general meaning” neither identical to “cause of action” nor
tightly correlated with it: “the debt is not the set of material facts. It is that which
is begotten by the set of material facts” (CGU, 628B-C).
10 The use of the word “material” here introduces some confusion, since a
material fact is usually only “material” in relation to a particular cause of action.
However, it seems to me that the background facts in CGU indicate that a
“debt” need not be as tightly tied to a “cause of action” as was suggested in
Evins. In CGU, the plaintiff , Rumdel, had initially claimed indemnification for
storm damage under a single contract of insurance which did not, on its face,
cover some of the damage for which Rumdel claimed. Rumdel later (after the
claim would otherwise have prescribed) amended its particulars of claim to
introduce a second contract of insurance which covered the damage to which
the first contract did not extend. CGU argued that the debt claimed in the
amended particulars was different to the debt claimed in the original. The
Supreme Court of Appeal held that the debt was substantially the same debt,
6
since the amount claimed had not changed, and the claim was still one for
indemnification under a contract of insurance. All that had changed were the
terms of contract under which indemnification was due. That changed
Rumdel’s cause of action, but it did not alter the nature of the debt.
11 I think this case is similar in its essentials. When Mr. Riga amended his
particulars of claim, he did not alter the amount he claimed. (The 2023
particulars put a figure on Mr. Riga’s claim for loss of remuneration, while the
2024 particulars do not, but this is of no moment, since the loss claimed is
identical). Nor did the nature of his claim really change: it was and remains for
loss caused by what he says was his wrongful dismissal. The facts underlying
the claim have not changed either: they are, in substance, that Mr. Riga was
dismissed for bringing to light audit problems over which his superiors would
rather have drawn a veil. All that did ultimately change was the basis on which
Mr. Riga claimed that his dismissal was wrongful: he initially claimed that it
was wrongful because it breached his contract; he now claims that it was
wrongful because it was in breach of the Protected Disclosures Act. During
argument, I asked Mr. Whitcutt whether Mr. Riga’s claim would have
prescribed if he had pleaded the relevant provisions of the Protected
Disclosures Act as implied terms of his employment contract. Mr. Whitcutt
accepted that the special plea could not have been sustained in those
circumstances. I agree, but I think it also follows that Mr. Riga’s preference for
direct reliance on the statute did not fundamentally alter the nature of the debt
he claimed in his amended particulars.
8
HEARD ON: 25 August 2026
DECIDED ON: 8 September 2026
For the Plaintiff: A Bester SC
S Ebrahim
Instructed by Marweshe Attorneys
For the Defendant: C Whitcutt SC
(Heads of argument drawn by A Subel SC)
Instructed by Soldatos Cooper Inc