As South Africa President Cyril Ramaphosa extended the basic income grant given to vulnerable citizens until March 2023, the number of welfare recipients has now exceeded the number of taxpayers in that country.
The monthly welfare stipend of 350 rands was introduced in March 2020 to provide support for the poor and most vulnerable in South Africa. Several activists and groups have demanded that the government makes this payment permanent whilst economists say that the country can scarcely afford it. After his state of the nation address on February 10, President Ramaphosa extended the payment till March 2023. This move adds ten million more people to its safety net programmes that include health care for the young and elderly.
With this extension, the number of welfare recipients now total 28 million, far above the 22 million people that are able to hold a job and pay tax.
Recently, Siyabulela Mama, Spokesman of the Assembly of the Unemployed, told Business Edge that the 350 rands was inadequate to cater for citizens who are unemployed, saying “350 rands in a month is [approximately] 11 rands per day. That cannot even buy a loaf of bread. [There is] two trillion rands in Government Employees Pensions Fund] there and workers continue to contribute 6% of their pay into it. Take this money and put it into financing a social wage, that’s how you can afford to pay a basic income grant.”
Before the introduction of the basic income grant, more than 18% of the South African population received some form of aid from the government. Analysts have expressed concern that making it permanent would add between one hundred and fifty billion rands and five hundred and seventeen billion rands to its expenditure per year. President Ramaphosa insists, however, that his administration is determined to see the country recover and will leave no one behind.
