By Prof. Hugo Pienaar | Director and Alex van Greuning | Associate

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A heartbreaking case from the Mpumalanga High Court reminds employers that COIDA’s protections are not a blanket shield. The parents of a minor child - killed by a leopard at staff housing inside the Kruger National Park - may proceed with a damages claim against the South African National Parks (SANParks). The court dismissed SANPark’s special plea that section 35(1) of the Compensation for Occupational Injuries and Diseases Act, 130 of 1993 (COIDA) bars the father’s claim.

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A human tragedy with a legal question

The first plaintiff (the father) worked for SANParks and was required to live with his family in staff quarters at Malelane Camp. On the morning of the incident, while he was on his way to work, the couple’s child was attacked and killed by a leopard at the staff housing. Both parents sued for funeral expenses and pain and suffering. SANParks raised a special plea only against the father, arguing that COIDA section 35(1) prevents an employee (or a dependant) from suing the employer in damages for an occupational injury or death. The mother’s claim proceeded without that plea.

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COIDA in plain terms

Section 35(1) removes an employee’s common law damages claim against the employer only when the claim is ‘in respect of an occupational injury or disease’ - that is, an accident ‘arising out of and in the course of’ the employee’s employment that causes the employee’s own injury, illness, or death. Put differently: the statute bars claims about harm to the employee, and only where the harm is sufficiently connected to the employment relationship. It does not automatically bar every harm suffered on employer premises, and it does not convert every tragic event into an ‘occupational injury.’

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What the court decided

Assessing the pleaded facts as a stated case, the court asked whether the child’s death was an accident arising out of and ‘in the course of’ the father’s employment. It held that, although the father resided in staff housing in furtherance of SANParks’s interests, the killing of his child was not sufficiently connected to the performance of his duties to qualify as an occupational injury under COIDA. The special plea failed, and the matter may proceed on the merits for both parents.

The judgment however, failed to underscore what should have been the main point: the child was not an employee. Framing the loss as an ‘occupational injury’ to trigger section 35(1) was conceptually misplaced; section 35(1) speaks to disablement or death of the employee, not of a third party.

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Practical implications

Month-to-month life on employer premises, high-risk environments, or remote operations can blur the lines between ‘at work’ and ‘at home.’ This case affirms that COIDA’s section 35(1) bar is narrow: employers cannot assume automatic immunity simply because an employee (or family) lives on-site, or because an incident occurs on employer property. The analysis remains: is the harm claimed truly an occupational injury to the employee, arising out of and in the course of employment? If not, civil claims can proceed.

Employers are encouraged to:

• Revisit risk assessments and duty-of-care measures in staff housing or employer-provided accommodation, especially in higher-hazard settings
• Ensure incident response, counselling and bereavement support are available. This is first and foremost about people
• When COIDA is implicated, evaluate carefully whether section 35(1) genuinely applies to the employee’s injury, and whether the employment nexus is strong enough to trigger the bar

Nothing in COIDA prevents employers from doing the right thing after a tragedy. This judgment is a legal reminder, but its first lesson is human: policies and protections must work where people live and work, especially when their families share that space.

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