'Tell us what the deal is with SASSA and CPS' - Freedom Under Law asks to join court action

A not-for-profit legal group is asking to intervene in the application by the Black Sash around the arrangements between the South African Social Services Agency (SASSA) and Cash Paymaster Services (CPS) for the payment of social grants after 31 March 2017.

Freedom Under Law (FUL) director Nicole Fritz said on Tuesday they support the relief sought by the Black Sash‚ which filed a case with the Constitutional Court last week demanding that any contract between Sassa and CPS have the court’s oversight and that Social Development Minister Bathabile Dlamini report to the court regularly.

• MPs grill Dlamini on company paying social grantsParliament's Standing Committee on Public Accounts (Scopa) wants Social Development Minister Bathabile Dlamini to explain why a white-owned company has been contracted to make social grant payments in the wake of President Jacob Zuma's call for radical economic transformation in his State of the Nation address. 

However‚ FUL also wants to ask the court to order the disclosure of all documentation relating to the interim contracting between SASSA and CPS.

In addition‚ it would like to ask "that CPS be prevented from benefitting from the 2012 contract‚ declared by the Constitutional Court to be invalid. Specifically‚ CPS should be entitled to charge no more under the interim contract than it is currently charging under the 2012 contract and the proposed interim contract must be in place no longer than necessary for a tender for the distribution of social grants to be advertised‚ adjudicated and awarded". FUL is seeking to intervene on the basis that the matter has clear implications for the rule of law and the obligations of a constitutional democracy.

• Letters reveal Sassa warned months ago about looming social grants crisisAn exchange of letters reveals that Cash Paymaster Services (CPS) urged the SA Social Security Agency (Sassa) almost a year ago to avoid several pitfalls that could lead to a social grants crisis. 

"A ruling of the highest court of the land‚ carefully structured so as best to protect the rights and interests of the most vulnerable in our country‚ has been cynically disregarded. Instead the security of those dependent on social grants has been recklessly imperilled in a bid to ensure the interim contracting process escapes scrutiny and oversight‚" said Fritz. The NGO aims to promote democracy under law and to assist insecuring the independence of the judiciary.