New undertaking on grants service provider
THE Department of Social Development will start phasing out CPS as the social grants service provider by November.
Speaking during her department’s annual budget debate, Minister Bathabile Dlamini apologised for the confusion created when the Cash Paymaster Services contract, due to expire, landed up in the Constitutional Court earlier this year.
But she said the doomsayers who had wished that payments would not be made, had been disappointed.
Dlamini said her department had moved swiftly to incorporate the Constitutional Court rulings into the annual performance plan and would start phasing in the services of a new service provider by November to ensure a seamless hand-over.
Dlamini had previously told parliament it would take five years and about R6-billion to move the payment of social grants over to the South African Social Security Agency.
The Social Development Department, with a budget of R160-billion, receives the biggest budget of all the government departments. Of this, R151-billion goes towards social grants spending.
Dlamini said her department aimed to amend the Social Assistance Act this year to ensure funeral and savings funds for social grants beneficiaries.
Social development committee chair Nokuzola Capa thanked her and her department for the clear answers given when required.
But opposition parties were not quite as complimentary, with the DA’s Bridget Masango calling for Dlamini to step down after she had “mysteriously survived the midnight reshuffle”.
Masango said Dlamini could not be trusted with the budget because of her chaotic style of leadership and R1-billion of irregular expenditure in her department.
The EFF’s Makoti Kawula said the minister had failed pensioners and orphans, giving them meagre grants while using funds to hire bodyguards and buy cars. The IFP’s Liesl van der Merwe criticised Dlamini’s poor leadership but supported the budget, because she said it was a matter of life or death for many poor South Africans.
The Sassa crisis was far from over, she said.