NEHAWU CONCERNED ABOUT THE HEALTH AND SAFETY OF BENEFICIARIES AND WORKERS DUE TO INFLUX TO SASSA OFFICES
Friday January 15, 2021
The National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union (NEHAWU) is concerned about the health and safety of its members, workers and grant beneficiaries at the South African Social Security Agency (SASSA) local offices especially in the Western Cape.
In the past couple of days, SASSA offices have experienced a large number of beneficiaries queuing to access services. Most of the beneficiaries are flocking to the offices to renew their Temporary Disability Grants which lapsed last year and at the time NEHAWU called for their extension for a further six months considering that we had a hard lockdown, however, our call fell on deaf ears.
The long queues are a danger to the health and safety of our people because there is no social distancing which potentially increases the risk of contracting the coronavirus. Moreover, beneficiaries have to queue overnight and sleep in the blistering cold in order to receive services in the SASSA offices. This is disheartening considering that most of these beneficiaries are disabled and very old.
As NEHAWU, we believe that SASSA could have planned much better to deal with this situation. Furthermore, we find it abhorrent that the Minister visited Khayelitsha only yesterday to assess the situation when it had been out of hand for a while. A caring government would have moved with speed to attend to the most vulnerable sector of our society. In this regard, we call upon the Department of Social Development and SASSA to consider the extension of the Temporary Disability Grants up until the agency can present a proper plan to deal with the influx at SASSA local offices as a means to reduce transmission of the virus during the current second wave.