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JOHANNESBURG – There are growing calls to extend the COVID-19 Social Relief of Distress and Caregiver grants.
Some civil society organizations also want the R350 grant to be increased to R585.
READ: Post Office Reassures Social Grant Recipients
The Institute of Economic Justice warns that the suspension of subsidies will cause a humanitarian crisis.
Neil Coleman of the Institute said, “Imagine that a grant of R350, for a month, has to help an unemployed person and their dependents, it is amazing to imagine the struggles that people have. The grant of a caregiver is R500”.
READ: COVID-19: Sassa Will Make Double Payments To Aid Grant Recipients
“These are minimum amounts introduced by the government when the COVID shutdown occurred, under the assumption that six months later (which is how long the subsidies were in place) the economy would have recovered and these people would have been able to improve their standards of lifetime.
“All the research shows that the effects of the shutdown continue to be devastating for many, many people.”
Coleman estimates that nearly 13 million South Africans are grant recipients, not including dependents, and if left untreated, it will lead to a nationwide humanitarian crisis.
