Daily Dispatch

Probe into NPO budget slash

SOCIAL development MEC Nancy Sihlwayi’s decision to ask the provincial and National Treasury to help investigate how the millions of rands disbursed each year to non-profit organisations are spent, is a step in the right direction.

These developments come after reports in this newspaper about the plight of NPOs across the province following the department’s decision to drastically slash their budgets for the current financial year.

The cuts which were so drastic in some cases, forcing several NPOs, including the East London and King William’s Town Child Welfare centres, to consider retrenching their staff.

The East London Child Welfare (ELCW) had to temporarily close to allow them to review their organisational structure.

Thankfully the department had a rethink of its decision – with Sihlwayi instructing her department head Ntombi Baart to find money elsewhere and undo some of the damage.

There was a collective sigh of relief when the department apologised unreservedly for the confusion. “We are sorry for the inconvenience caused to all the NPOs.

“We admit that there was a lack of communication from the department and maybe we should have introduced the reductions in phases, but we are making a commitment to revisit these subsidies,” said Baart two weeks after ELCW closed shop.

While the reversal of the controversial decision to slash budgets was welcomed by all parties involved, it came too late for some social workers who had already lost their jobs.

The damage had been done already and a lot of unanswered questions remain.

What forced the department to cut budgets so drastically? Also, who are these NPOs receiving funding for the first time? How were they surviving before the government’s intervention?

Now that there is an investigation into the NPO sector, it should not be used as a ruse to justify the slashing of budgets for legitimate NPOs. If there are rogues within the sector, then they should be isolated and prosecuted. In today’s report, Sihlwayi says they found some NPOs in Sarah Baartman and Chris Hani district were using a common bank account – suggesting that fraud could be involved. The investigation is also an admission by the provincial department of social development that they do not have proper monitoring mechanisms. If they did, then they would have been able to easily pick up the duplication of bank account details for various NPOs.

Only deserving NPOs should be receiving funding from the state. If there is any taxpayers’ money which ended up in the wrong hands, those rogue NPOs should face the full might of the law. Basically they are stealing from vulnerable children and women.

But also the department should be transparent about the rationale it used to decide on grants for NPOs.

These NPOs provide necessary support to the government and service to our communities who are buckling under the immense weight of social ills, such as alcoholism, women and child abuse.

Treasury’s investigation should help clear the air and get to the bottom of the matter.