Grant saga is getting uglier

AT THE end of the month, the contract to distribute social grants to millions of poor South Africans ends. The contract, which the Constitutional Court found in 2014 to have been irregularly awarded and invalid, has been the source of drama and controversy over the year.

Today we sit with the possibility of 17 million citizens, who include the elderly, the sick and orphans, not receiving their grants next month.

While officials bicker and push their own interests in an ugly battle to influence who will distribute the R10 billion a month in grants, there appears to be no plan to ensure that recipients receive them. There is no sense of urgency.

On Tuesday, Social Development Minister Bathabile Dlamini incurred the wrath of Parliament’s standing committee on public accounts (Scopa) when she failed to appear before it to shed light on what would happen when Cash Paymaster Services’s (CPS) contract ends on March 31. She defended her no-show, arguing she had appeared before the portfolio committee on social development, “and that is the place we feel we have to account”.

Dlamini left it to acting SA Social Security Agency (Sassa) chief executive Thamo Mzobe and his delegation to explain the readiness to ensure grants were distributed from April.

Sassa official Zodwa Mvulane dropped the bombshell: there was no plan.

Dlamini has also clashed with Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan about who should next distribute the grants. He believes it would be unwise to extend the contract, given that the Concourt found it to be irregular, and prefers the banks to do the work. Dlamini argues that the banks do not have biometric capacity to do the job. Gordhan wants this requirement eased to allow new players to bid.

On Tuesday, community-based organisation Black Sash entered the fray, lodging a Concourt bid to stop Sassa from extending the contract without the supervision of the highest court in the land.

Sassa is headed by acting chief executive Mzobe, who was parachuted from another parastatal, the National Development Agency, after grants boss Thokozani Magwaza was allegedly suspended following a fallout with Dlamini. Spokesperson Paseka Letsatsi denies Magwaza was suspended and claims he is on “sick leave”. But questions arise over why an official from another agency would be brought in to fill in for someone who is on “sick leave”.

All this points to a looming crisis in the payment of social grants and it is likely that we will see court bids to end the madness.

In all this, the interests of the 17 million grant recipients must not be forgotten.