Today, the social development department together with its entity, the SA Social Security Agency (SASSA), embarked on a follow-up payments process of the majority of social grants recipients, which is planned to run until 21 April.
Social development minister Bathabile Dlamini and SASSA officials are on duty to ensure millions of beneficiaries are paid today.
This comes on the back of growing concern the country's most vulnerable citizens would be left stranded on 1 April, following SASSA and the department failing to timeously find a suitable payments provider when the invalid payments contract expired at the end of March.
Cash Paymaster Services (CPS), a subsidiary of US-based Net1 UEPS Technologies, has been the sole paymaster of social grants in SA, despite an invalid contract.
In 2013, the Constitutional Court (ConCourt) declared the contract invalid after it emerged irregular tendering processes were followed in the awarding of the tender, but suspended the invalidity declaration pending the contract's expiration.
Last month, the ConCourt was required to intervene once more when it permitted the extension of the current invalid social grants payments contract for another 12 months. The extension was to avert a social payments disaster and ensure millions of beneficiaries received payments.
SASSA, which began the next wave of social grant payments this morning, confirmed over six million transactions beneficiaries accessed their social grants nationwide on 1 April.
Day one of the payment cycle saw beneficiaries who receive their social grants through ATMs and merchants paid their monies.
According to SASSA, today pay points are operating as normal and recipients are encouraged to go on their respective days and respective pay points as indicated on the slips they received last month.
Tread carefully
In a SENS statement, the Net1 subsidiary announced it had signed an addendum to its contract with SASSA.
According to the statement, the addendum extends the existing contract for a period of 12 months to 31 March 2018, under the current contract's terms and conditions, and also includes the specific terms as ordered by the ConCourt ruling.
CPS has received nationwide backlash from human rights organisations like the Black Sash after complaints from many grant beneficiaries about not receiving their grant monies in full, often the only source of income.
The department and SASSA have also raised concerns with CPS over deductions made from social grant recipients' accounts.
Despite these concerns, the ConCourt was forced to extend the CPS contract as it is the only entity that would be able to ensure social grant recipients receive their monies.
CPS says in the statement, "The company confirms that payment of the April grants to 10.5 million grant recipients is on track and affirms its commitment to uninterrupted service delivery."
Shifting blame
Meanwhile, Dlamini was required to submit an affidavit to the ConCourt on Friday to motivate why she should not be held personally liable for the social grants payment crisis.
The minister has laid the blame on SASSA and its CEO, Thokozani Magwaza.
In its ruling last month, the ConCourt said the minister and the agency both failed to keep their promise to the court and the people of SA.
Business Day reports that in the affidavit filed on Friday, Dlamini reiterated she was only informed SASSA would not be able to administer payments in October 2016, although the agency had this knowledge from April last year.
Dlamini told the court the change in leadership at SASSA between 2012 and 2016 is explanation for the information the agency had and the information that was provided to her, according to Business Day.
"The effect of the change in leadership at SASSA, and the fact that Mr Magwaza failed to engage comprehensively with me during this critical time, in my view, contributed to the delays in implementation of certain critical decisions."
The court will be required to decide why Dlamini should not be held personally liable for the social grants saga.
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