SASSA SRD Latest News Today 12th-July-2022 On Changes in Criteria
In SASSA SRD Latest News Today 12th-July-2022, Lindiwe Zulu, Minister of Social Development, has published a government gazette proposing significant modifications to the Social Relief of Distress (SRD) grant criteria. This comes after lobbying groups opposed the revised criteria, which had a negative impact on millions of SASSA SRD recipients.
The R350 award was administered under new rules that went into effect when the state of disaster was revoked. According to the Social Assistance Act, recipients of the Social Relief of Distress (SRD) grant who met the R350 monthly criterion were eligible to keep receiving the award.
There is a major issue that Minister Lindiwe Zulu of the Department of Social Development (DSD) has suggested to amend in the newly published government gazette.
The department is now seeking to have the income threshold increased from R350 to R624 per month, according to the gazette.
This comes after Sassa faced criticism after lobby groups complained that millions of recipients had been negatively impacted by the initial reduction in the income criterion, which went from R545 per month to R350 grant, excluding holders of caregiver grants.
The South African Social Security Agency (Sassa) received 10.9 million applications for the SRD grant, of which 5 million were approved and about 5 million were denied.
While advocacy organizations argued for modifications to the new standards set forth in the legislation, they also emphasized the fact that many South Africans are living in poverty.
According to StatsSa, people who have R624 available per month for food were considered to be below the poverty level under South African national criteria.
The public has been urged in the gazette to submit written comments to the DSD by July 29, 2022, regarding the plan.
