The government doesn’t want people randomly handing out food parcels under lockdown – and there are some good reasons for that. But frustration is brewing over the complex bureaucracy governing food distribution while people go hungry. Now, legal action may be pending.
In the small Eastern Cape town of Cradock, there was food available for those in need. The local Spar had donated 300 food parcels for distribution. But for days in late April, the food languished in a local community centre – despite the fact that the parcels included perishable vegetables.
“People were asking: What’s happened to this donation?” Cradock local Neville Phillips told Daily Maverick.
What had happened was that the Spar donation had been handed over to the local municipality, as per lockdown regulations. After Phillips took to Facebook to raise the alarm over the non-distribution of the food, he received a phone call from the mayor’s office informing him of the reason for the delay.
“Why they hadn’t distributed the parcels was that as government, they can’t distribute a parcel that is not up to Sassa [South African Social Security Agency] levels in terms of quantity,” Phillips said.
Sassa food parcels are intended to keep people…
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Article source: https://allafrica.com/stories/202005050210.html