Unnecessary red tape for donations will chase donors away

28 April 2020

The Democratic Alliance (DA) in Gauteng notes with great concern the directive issued by the Gauteng Department of Social Development Head of Department, Thembeni Mhlongo pertaining to any kind of donations as part of the Gauteng Food Relief Scheme.

According to the letter of authorisation to donors, only the department is facilitating and receiving donations from all organisations, companies, civil society bodies and individuals’ citizens who would like to assist. All donations must be delivered to the Booysen warehouse in the City of Johannesburg and if an organisation wishes to distribute food or any donations directly to the communities they need to abide by the stipulated conditions.

These conditions include that an organisation that wishes to distribute directly to communities must apply for an authorization letter from the department and the application must be submitted by no less than 48 hours before the envisaged distribution date. Upon receipt of the authorisation letter from the department, the organization must ensure that they have informed the local police station. Only food parcels are allowed, no cooked meals are permitted, and the distribution must be done in collaboration with the department.

The DA is concerned that the department has proven to be incompetent in this area and won’t be able to issue authorisation letters to the donors in time.

The same department also made a promise that the food parcels will be delivered within 48 hours and failed to meet its allocated timeframe.

The department does not have the capacity to deal with this crisis by themselves and the challenges currently being faced with regards to food parcel distribution clearly indicates that they are not capacitated to deal with this centralised process.

We also submitted a list of NGOs which were willing to assist on the first day of the lockdown, more than 30 days ago, however the department is yet to respond and has not yet issued permits to these NGO's.

While we understand the need and importance of adhering to the lockdown regulations, alienating NGOs with these strict red tape measures means that more people will be left hungry and destitute.

The DA calls on the Acting Gauteng MEC for Social Development, Panyaza Lesufi to reconsider the terms on the letter of authorisation for donors and to rather issue a framework within which the NGOs can operate and comply with the lockdown regulations instead of trying to centralise the entire process.

Issued by RefiloeNt’sekhe, DA Gauteng Shadow MEC for Social Development, 28 April 2020