Was the social grants fiasco orchestrated to undermine the judiciary and the Constitution and hide sheer incompetence on the part of government?
The social grants system has been taken captive. Its captor is grabbing all that he can, before he’s deposed. The minster’s fought to give him time.
The chief justice asked why the social development minister had allowed the grants agency to ’embarrass’ her.
A ministerial task team led by Minister Jeff Radebe will appoint new negotiators to strike a deal with Cash Paymaster Services
The crisis swirling around South Africa’s system of welfare payments to the poorest third of its people has become a game of chicken.
Dlamini did not apologise for her late submission, but instead said she had ‘made every reasonable effort to comply with this court’s directives’.
Social Development Minister Bathabile Dlamini and the social grants agency’s Thamo Mzobe and Wiseman Magasela will have to submit affidavits by 3pm.
Senior counsel Wim Trengove says exemption from the bidding process is not legal and the agency’s social grants payment crisis is self-inflicted.
The South African Social Security Agency sent a copy of its answers to Concourt’s detailed questions six hours after its deadline to do so.
The social welfare agency could not answer pointed questions on the grants crisis by 4pm and said the court cannot dictate how much it should pay CPS.