Sassa, social development officials a no-show in Parliament
The parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Social Development will take legal advice after officials failed to pitch for a meeting.
Social development minister Bathabile Dlamini, department officials as well as officials from the South African Social Security Agency (Sassa) were expected to answer questions on the migration of the social grant scheme.
The payment of social grants is to be handed over from Cash Paymaster Services to the South African Post Office (Sapo).
The committee has labelled Sassa's absence as "gross negligence".
Committee chairperson Rosemary Capa says social development minister Bathabile Dlamini had sent an apology.
However, the committee raised concern about the absence of her deputy Hendrietta Bogopane-Zulu.
Capa says the deputy minister has not attended one committee meeting this year.
The committee says deputy minister Hendrietta Bogopane-Zulu has not attended one committee meeting this year.#Sassa
— Jacaranda News (@JacaNews) October 18, 2017
Acting Sassa CEO, Pearl Bhengu, says they "did not have substantial progress to report since their last meeting".
Sassa has requested a postponement until November.
"The Committee agreed that the next step will be to summon Sassa, the ministry and the department to account for the delays in appointing Sapo to take over the payment of social grants," Capa says in a statement.
She says Sassa's failure to attend the meeting undermines the work of the committee and is unacceptable.