File: South African Rands. GettyImages/RapidEye
JOHANNESBURG - Access to basic nutrition, shelter, healthcare and social services is a fundamental human right enshrined in South Africa’s Constitution.
But what happens when rights are stripped away?
The non-payment of subsidies to Gauteng non-profit organisations is a disaster in the making.
Many of these organisations are still recovering from last year’s prolonged battle with the provincial Department of Social Development over delayed payments.
Their role in keeping the province’s most vulnerable safe cannot be understated.
Many of them serve as homes and safe havens for women, children, the elderly, and people with disabilities.
And without money from the government, these organsations will be forced to scale back on the services they provide, retrench staff, or even shut their doors. Doing so would push many deeper into poverty, homelessness, and even abuse.
Epworth Child and Youth Care Centre in Germiston accommodates 84 children.
It has provided services to children at risk since 1918, but now finds itself on the verge of closure.
The organisation has been relying on donations to keep its doors open.
It faced the same threat last May, when the department failed to pay many NPOs on time.
In November 2023, the department withheld R380,000 pending the signing of a service-level agreement (SLA).
The organisation had been deprived of R1.5 million the previous year – again due to contractual issues that required legal intervention.
Epworth director Penny-Ann Lundie says the department’s failure to pay subsidies on time threatens their operations.
“We are running an organisation. There is petrol, groceries, and salaries. Luckily, the community stepped up when we were about to close and that has been keeping us going at the moment,” she says.
Last year, the Gauteng Care Crisis Committee slammed the department for its handling of subsidies.
At the time, the committee listed 17 non-profit organisations that had depleted their subsidies for 2023/24.
Some of the organisations were forced to shut down, depriving thousands of critical services.
A year later, the committee is once again sounding the alarm over non-payments.
Lundie says while there is no expectation that payments must be made on 1 April, when Treasury releases funds, it’s expected that SLAs must be in place by 31 March.
"This is not an unreasonable demand, it is the standard set by the national Department of Social Development’s sector funding policy. However, the DSD only began signing contracts in mid-April and making payments from 9 May onward," she said.
Social Development MEC Faith Mazibuko told the Gauteng Legislature that while the department experienced funding challenges in the previous financial year, those challenges had been addressed.
She said the narrative of a “crisis” was a “gross misrepresentation” of facts.
She told the legislature that, for 2025/26, the department had:
• Received 2,000 applications for funding;
• Issued 1,200 letters confirming funding; and
• Signed over 300 SLAs.
The MEC also revealed that a formal appeals process was underway for unsuccessful applicants.
Gauteng Care Crisis Committee chair Lisa Vetten, however, says this is not enough, as the department has not indicated how many of the award letters will be converted into SLAs. She adds that at least 800 organisations that did not receive award letters have likely been excluded from funding.
Vetten has called for payments to be expedited, saying the department must publish a full list of organisations that will be funded for 2025/26. She says the department must also disclose the number of rejected organisations.
Gauteng Social Development spokesperson Teddy Gomba attributes the delays to “technical issues at Treasury”.
“This does not constitute a crisis, as several other provinces have experienced similar delays in the past week,” he says.
Gomba adds that the department spent 96% of its total allocated budget for NPOs in 2024/25, with “the 4% non-payment due to non-compliance on the side of NPOs”.
He also blames the late signing of some SLAs on non-compliant NPOs, and says payments are being made to qualifying organisations.
“NPOs were made aware of delays. The change of [financial years] sees lots of processing of payments, so there was a technical glitch with the payment system. Payments have resumed; 395 payments have been processed successfully to date, and more
payments are ongoing. There are no failures, just delays because of the reasons given above.”
By Zandile Khumalo