South Africa’s Social Development Minister Lindiwe Zulu on Friday said her office had allocated nearly US$3 billion in Covid-19 social relief grants to over 8.1 million people in the past few weeks.
Addressing the National Assembly during her ministry’s budget vote, Zulu said the “application channels for the grant for the period from April 2022 to March 2023, as announced by the President, opened on 23 April 2022.”
“By 30 April 2022 in excess of 8.1 million applications had already been received to receive the $2.93 allocation for the Covid-19 Social Relief of Distress (SRD) grant for the 2022/23 financial year,” Zulu said.
She assured all qualifying applicants that they would “be in receipt of their payments for this iteration of the grant by June.”
“This means that each month 10.5 million approved applicants will receive this important social safety net intervention that cushions them and their families against the constraints of unemployment and poverty,” the minister said.
Zulu said her office was extending its negotiations to include local fast-moving consumer goods traders as part of their payment outlets for the Covid-19 grant.
“I wish to reiterate our government’s commitment and readiness to fight crime syndicates and criminals who are defrauding the State,” the minister said.
She added: “To this end, we are continuing to work together with the relevant law enforcement agencies to ensure that these and their actions are detected, isolated, arrested and successfully prosecuted.”
NM/jn/APA