It was from within the ANC itself that the opposition to child grant cuts came, forcing the minister of welfare to reassess her proposed scheme, writes Marion Edmunds
PRACTICAL problems and criticism from within the African National Congress have driven Minister of Welfare Geraldine Fraser- Moleketi to back away from key parts of her controversial child grants.
Fraser-Moleketi told the Mail & Guardian that the scheme would only be implemented next year – not from August 1 as planned. The method of phasing out the current grants – received mostly by whites, coloureds and Indians – could be changed, she added.
Originally the grants were to be phased out over five years, dropping 20% a year, to cushion families entirely dependent on state money. Fraser-Moleketi asked not to be questioned on this aspect of the plan, because of her uncertainty.
At the ANC’s caucus meeting last week she was taken to task by senior members. It is believed a number of ANC MPs oppose phasing out the grants over five years as it would lead to a disparity in pay-outs which would continue to exist during the 1999 election campaign and could be used against the ANC.
There have also been complaints about the proposals from concerned non-governmental organisations (NGOs), which have been fighting the reduction of state grants on grounds that too little money would be provided to too few mothers and children.
The NGOs have presented Parliament with information about the destitution which coloured and Indian recipients would suffer if their current grants were removed.
Even Deputy President Thabo Mbeki joined the debate by saying in Parliament this week: “At the heart of this matter is the unswerving determination of the government to end the system of racial discrimination in the system of welfare benefits, which in this specific instance resulted in the exclusion of the African mother and child.
“It is therefore inevitable that an adjustment be made, so as to bring into the net the greatest possible number of people.”
Fraser-Moleketi is having to go back to the drawing-board to grapple with how to introduce equity in state grants, remain within budgetary limits and please all constituencies.
Her department is also ill-equipped to implement such a scheme. It has not yet developed a means test through which it can target the recipients of the intended new scheme – the 30% poorest children in the land.
Research must still be done to identify them, and pilot projects have yet to be set up. The department is establishing a task- team to help find solutions and ways of implementing them.
Further, after a series of public hearings, the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Welfare rejected Fraser-Moleketi’s proposed grant of R75 a month to the poorest children up to six years. It is expected the committee will propose that the state pay R135 per child up to the age of 12 years.
Fraser-Moleketi is defensive about her shifts in position: “August 1 is not the date for actual implementation, it is the time by which we are going to have a plan on the table … so we are actually talking about implementation in the beginning of 1998, with possibly some take up by the end of 1997.”