WELFARE GRANTS FIASCO
AUBREY MATSHIQI: None so deaf as those without answers
Like me, many a vernacular speaker must have cried when our language was, in defence of the indefensible, hijacked in Sandton on Sunday. The indefensible in this case is the litany of excuses, fake truths and alternative facts in which Social Development Minister Bathabile Dlamini and her spokeswoman, Lumka Oliphant, have been trying to drown the truth about the South African Social Security Agency (Sassa) crisis. If, like me, you spent the past two weekends watching the James Bond festival on DStv, you are oblivious to the fact that, come April 1, the 17-million recipients of social grants may not receive them because Dlamini has handled the matter with the kind of efficacy that, until now, has been the sole preserve of the other spy, Austin Powers. Three years ago, the Constitutional Court found the contract between Cash Paymaster Services (CPS) and Sassa, an agency of the Department of Social Development, was invalid. If my memory serves me well, this happened because the require...
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