Over R5-million to be paid to Tshwane NPOs
This follows delays in payments to NPOs such as Centurion Council for the Aged, Youth for Survival and the Good Hope community organisation.
Over R5-million in delayed subsidy payments will be paid out to about 35 Tshwane NPOs by this Friday, according to the Gauteng Department of Social Development.
This as R5 625 499 will be distributed amongst organisations such as the Tshwane Leadership Foundation; St Joseph Care and Support Trust; and the Tshwane North Outreach (Wolmer).
Other organisations include the Centurion Council for the Aged, Youth for Survival and the Good Hope community organisation.
According to a spokesperson for the department, the delays were mostly because of the recent civil unrest in Johannesburg.
“There were other reasons too,” said spokesperson Feziwe Ndwayana.
Chief among them was NPO boards signing service level agreements for the 2021/22 financial year taking longer than expected.
“Some NGOs could not sign the agreements as their registration status had expired.
“Operating licences for some sectors such as early childhood development, service centres luncheon clubs, drop-in centres for HIV, were affected by changes in municipal by-laws.”
The department’s failure to pay out these subsidies reportedly put vulnerable children such as orphans, homeless, and victimised children and families in Tshwane at the risk of starvation.
Ndwayana said the department was, however, hard at work remedying the subsidy payment delays.
Mismanagement of funds by some NPOs was also a problem, she said.
“One organisation was unable to account for R3,9-million allocated to them.”
The issue made headlines last week when DA social development spokesperson Bronwynn Engelbrecht said the delays put vulnerable children in Tshwane at risk.
“Due to delays of payments in subsidies, the placement of the children to safe homes through adoptions was disrupted,” said Engelbrecht.
“NPOs in Pretoria provide food, clothing and shelter to destitute families, while others provided child protection services and adoptions and assessment processes.
“They fulfil an important role in our fractured society and rely on every cent they get from the department.
“A failure by the department to fulfil its mandate like this would see vulnerable children being thrown under the bus with nowhere to go to find food and shelter.”
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