Uncontactable SASSA gives ominous taste of things to come

The South African Social Security Agency (SASSA) has been sending letters to grant recipients, advising them that their grants can in future be paid directly into bank accounts, if they have them. The procedure described is to collect a form from a SASSA office, have it stamped by the applicant's bank and returned in person to the Agency.

In practice, this procedure is clumsy and time-consuming and very stressful for grant recipients who have difficulty with their mobility or health. The idea of queuing just to receive a form is normally associated with totalitarian regimes, but seems to have resurfaced in our democracy.

Worse, attempts to receive clarity on this Agency procedure and the possibility of simplifying it ran into a brick wall ; not a single one of ten SASSA offices in Gauteng called answered the phone and in most cases a recording told the DA that the mail box was full and no further messages could be accepted.

This is an ominous foretaste of things to come when SASSA takes over social payments to the county's grant recipients and DA representatives in the National Assembly will be requested to tackle this issue.

South Africans have suffered enough under the delinquent Minister of Social Development and her surrogates, this kind of added inconvenience is unnecessary.

Statement issued by Justus de Goede, DA Gauteng Spokesperson for Social Development, 22 January 2018