Social Development Minister Bathabile Dlamini has been summoned to account to Parliament’s oversight committee SCOPA for the looming crisis in the payment of social grants.
The current contract with Cash Paymaster Services (CPS) expires at the end of March. The original contract was overturned and, in 2014, the Constitutional Court prohibited the South African Social Security Agency (SASSA) from renewing it on its completion this year.
During that time, however, no alternative arrangements have been made to pay grants to about 17-million South Africans.
SASSA briefed SCOPA on 28 February, but Minister Dlamini was absent from that meeting.
SCOPA has now sent her a letter requesting her attendance on 7 March.
