Note to Editors: Please find attached English and Afrikaans soundbites by Cllr JP de Villiers and Sesotho soundbite by Cllr Joseph Mbele.
The Democratic Alliance in Ngwathe has launched a petition calling for the establishment of a permanent, fully operational SASSA office in Parys. The petition will be presented to the NCOP Petitions Commission to push for urgent action. The current arrangement is failing thousands of vulnerable residents and is unworthy of any community in South Africa.
At present, SASSA officials visit Parys only once a week, on Wednesdays. Residents who cannot resolve their matters in a single visit must wait a full week to return. Paper-based application forms are not available on site, so residents are expected to obtain and print them at their own expense and return them by the following Wednesday. In many cases, this cycle repeats for weeks on end.
The conditions at the current service point are equally unacceptable. While the renovation of the Municipal Hall is a welcome development, it has meant that SASSA has been using the Fezile Dabi Stadium as its service point in the meantime. Residents, many of them elderly pensioners, are forced to wait in the open with no proper shelter or shade. A stadium is not a fit-for-purpose venue for processing sensitive social grant applications. There is no suitable infrastructure for confidential consultations, no meaningful disability access, and no dignified waiting area for the elderly and vulnerable members of our community.
Because only one day of service is available per week, residents must arrive in the early morning, often before the sun is up, just to get ahead in the queue. With winter fast approaching, elderly residents and pensioners will be expected to stand in the dark and the cold for hours before they are even seen. This is simply inhumane.
There have also been cases where power outages at the venue have brought service delivery to a complete halt, leaving residents who have waited for hours with no assistance at all and no choice but to return the following week.
Our residents deserve daily access to reliable, dignified social services. They should not have to stand in the cold before sunrise, print their own forms, or travel to a makeshift service point only to be turned away because the power is out or the system is offline.
This petition shows SASSA and the national minister that the people of Parys are united. Every signature strengthens our case. We urge every resident, business owner, and community organisation to stand with us.
Communities of comparable size across South Africa already have permanent SASSA offices. There is no reason Parys should continue to be overlooked. The DA will continue fighting for the residents of Parys, for the facilities, and the dignity they deserve.