MARIANNE MERTEN, Cape Town | Monday
THE controversial delays around establishing a statutory body to distribute national lottery proceeds has taken another twist with the allocation of emergency funding to some cash-strapped organisations.
Although non-governmental organisations (NGOs) have welcomed the pre-Christmas emergency relief, some have questioned the legality of the once-off disbursement and say government continues to drag its heels over setting up the necessary structure required by the Lotteries Act.
Funding from scratch card games like Viva and Ithuba dried up when the national lottery started on March 13. The statutory distribution agency was initially expected to step in by mid-July. The agency and similar structures for arts, culture and heritage, sports and recreation and reconstruction and development will be in place only well into 2001.
While the national lottery has produced several millionaires, delays in establishing the distribution agency has deprived NGOs of much-needed cash.
But South African National NGO Coalition (Sangoco) deputy director Moshe More said there was “some doubt over the legitimacy” of the emergency grants. The miscellaneous purposes category of the Lotteries Act under which the payments are made was not a discretionary fund, but targeted to disasters like fires, floods or the cholera outbreak.
The National Lotteries Board has maintained there was nothing untoward about all this. Of the 115 organisations which met the November 30 deadline for requesting grants, 84 were considered because they received funding from scratch card games. This week the board contacted the successful groups, but the number or size of individual grants are not yet known.
“Many organisations are still in the lurch and hoping something will happen. They can’t plan and they can’t deliver. Many organisations had to retrench staff. Others had to close down,” More said.
The Johannesburg Child Welfare Society has had to dig into its reserves to survive while courting further financial troubles next year. It received an average of half a million rand each year between 1996 and 1999 from the scratch card competitions. “It’s not as if we have a gold mine,” said society assistant director Celia Theart.
The ongoing delays have also created dissatisfaction among NGOs which say there has been a lack of consultation and miscommunication.