A number of non-governmental organisations in the province caring for vulnerable children and the elderly have not yet been paid subsidies by the social development department.
The NGOs who look after orphaned, abandoned and abused children are struggling to keep afloat as they have not received their quarterly subsidies. Some of them will not be able to pay social workers.
This means that hundreds of the NGOs’ staff members face a bleak Christmas as the possibility that they might not be paid looms large.
However, late on Thursday the head of the social development department Ntombi Baart blamed the non-profit organisations for failing to perform proper financial and organisational accounting.
“Almost all NPOs were paid and only a few are outstanding and will be getting payment tomorrow and 24th December,” she said.
“There were delays for [the] third quarter of the financial year because it involves a lot of accountability from the NPOs, since we have reached half of the financial year.
“The lack of proper accountability of certain NPOs, particularly those with social worker posts and early childhood development centres that were unable to account for the actual number of children attended per particular month has exacerbated the situation.
“The department has implemented a new NPO management system in order to improve accountability and monitoring of public funds. The NPOs have been notified of the delays,” she said
Vuyiswa Duma-Maphumulo, convener of the Eastern Cape NPO Provincial Some of Forum, warned if the non-payments continued, this could lead to more of the institutions closing.
She said organisations which had gone unpaid worked with rape survivors, the disabled, pre-schools, and HIV-Aids affected people.
Dalene Ritter, from Child Welfare South Africa, warned the financial failures of the department would lead to the collapse of the social work sector in the province.
Late last year the NGOs found themselves in a similar situation leading to two East London-based NGOs closing its doors. Child Welfare East London and Isaiah 58 Children’s Village had to shut down as they could not stay afloat.
East London-based NGO Christelike Maatskaplike Raad (CMR) office manager Gaye Moonieya said the NGO had not been paid since September.
“This is the same problem we had last year when funds were not paid for eight months which resulted in some NGOs, such as Child Welfare closing down. By God’s grace we have managed to carry on but if we don’t get paid in January we will be in trouble,” she said.
She said that the department also undertook to pay the CMR an outstanding amount from last year of about R450,000 because it cut the NGOs subsidies so drastically and without consultation. She said none of the 12 CMR branches in the province had been paid.
CMR is a child protection agency that has been in existence for 63 years since 1955.
A Child Welfare Grahamstown manager who wanted to remain anonymous confirmed that they had not been paid this quarter which put the payment of salaries under threat.
“This is Christmas time. The social workers have families that rely on them. If we do not get that subsidy, that means the salaries will be affected. No subsidy no salary.”
The social development department had not responded to a request for comment at the time of writing.
“There is lack of communication from the department. It’s like they do not care. People’s salaries are at stake. People are complaining that they can’t buy things for their families.
“People are starting to lose trust in us as a forum. The department is stripping our people of their dignity,” Duma-Maphumulo said...