NPO staff, clients left destitute as funds withheld

“I WAITED for money for three months hoping to buy clothes for the baby I’m expecting. Nothing came. I can give birth any day and don’t have a single vest or pair of socks for the baby. I have reached a breaking point.”

This WhatsApp message was sent on Monday by a social worker employed by A re Ageng, an NPO serving abused women and children, on the West Rand.

The Gauteng Department of Social Development has withheld money contractually owed to the NPO after A re Ageng blew the whistle on alleged corruption or potential money laundering from the department. Staff have not been paid since January because the department froze the NPO’s funding in a move its staff label “harassment”.

The department also failed to meet a deadline set by the high court in Joburg to transfer about R1 million in back pay by April 7.

The social worker who sent the WhatsApp message says she can only scrape together enough money for one meal a day, even though she continues to work for the NPO. The entire organisation has continued to provide services to beneficiaries.

“I think (the department is) getting away with this as usual,” A re Ageng director Mpule Thejane Lenyehelo said. Because staff have been going out of pocket to keep the organisation running, Lenyehelo lost her funeral cover and life cover that she has been paying for more than 20 years.

The NPO’s electricity has been cut, and about 10 employees have been evicted because they can no longer pay rent. Others are pawning their possessions to keep their homes.

Mbangwa Xaba, the department’s spokesperson, incorrectly said the money was already paid to A re Ageng. “It was never government’s intention to punish the people who rely on it for care and well-being,” Xaba said.

A re Ageng and its attorneys plan to bring a lawsuit against the department for defamation and damages incurred by the department’s actions. These include temporarily freezing A re Ageng’s bank account, halting funding, moving beneficiaries without a plan to fully care for them and accusing the NPO staff of being behind an improper money transfer.

“Just because I’m a whistle-blower I am targeted. This is the type of gover nment we have,” Lenyehelo said. Since she went public with the department’s actions, she has been stalked by unknown observers, and an SAPS spokesperson acknowledged that police were needed for protection.

The case began when the department used A re Ageng as a conduit to transfer about R23m to Life Recovery Centre, an NPO managed by Life Esidimeni.

The Gauteng premier’s office and the provincial treasury have launched parallel investigations.

Observers say the investigations are already bearing fruit as Shoki Tshabalala, the head of department, resigned recently.

The department’s director of legal services, Victor Languza, sent an e-mail on April 1 in which he said A re Ageng was not “entitled to a renewal” of their service level agreements.

“It is not proper to assume that this case shall change the manner in which government does business,” he said.

“I could not have made this order if A re Ageng had not made noise,” Judge Brian Spilg said in the court on Thursday of his involvement in the case.

The case resumes on May 22.