The digitisation of South Africa’s social grant payment system was sold as promising to expand financial inclusion, but monopolisation by a single private company mutated it into a system of exploitation, according to the national director of the Black Sash, Lynette Maart. And the company, Net1, might not be done in the “social grant space” just yet, warned the Black Sash’s national advocacy manager, Hoodah Abrahams-Fayker.
Maart and Abrahams-Fayker were speaking during a webinar titled “Locked in! How South Africa came to rely on a digital social security payment monopolist”.
The webinar is part of a series, “Transformer States: A Conversation Series on Digital Government and Human Rights” organised by the Digital Welfare State and Human Rights Project. It is based at the New York University School of Law. Members of the project interview key people about a specific case study of digital government.
Bid to extend Covid-19 social grant gets green light
By Vernon Mchunu
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Durban - CALLS by civil society for the extension of the Covid-19 social relief grant moved a step closer to reality after the ANC national executive committee (NEC) proposed that the poverty alleviation measure be extended beyond the end of this month.
Since President Cyril Ramaphosa announced the adjusted level 3 lockdown regulations, civil society organisations and political parties have called for the continuation of the grant, saying it would go a long way towards addressing high levels of poverty and spiralling unemployment.
“In the context of the continuing Covid pandemic, we need to consider the extension of basic income relief to unemployed people who do not receive any other form of state assistance,” said Ramaphosa in his closing remarks after the weekend-long strategic meeting of the ANC NEC.
Civil society organisations and activists have welcomed the signing into law of the Social Assistance Amendment Bill and Prescription in Civil and Criminal Matters Amendment Bill.
SASSA beneficiaries water blasted while Lindiwe Zulu watches from Casspir comfort
During the Covid-19 pandemic, the disparity between the wealthy and the poor has become even more evident, with marginalised communities being left behind in the fight against Covid-19. People relying on South Africa’s social grant system are among the most vulnerable in our society. When grant recipients arrived at a SASSA office in Bellville in the Western Cape to renew their temporary disability grants, long queues formed outside the office. The queues and long waiting times were already enough of a concern to prompt a visit from Social Development Minister Lindiwe Zulu. While the minister was at the branch, people waiting to be assisted apparently failed to follow social distancing protocols. After beneficiaries failed to respond to requests by the minister to form an orderly line, The South African Police Service used water cannons to force the elderly, ill and physically challenged into lines.