18 Oct 2016

Old age pensioners in Lobatse have decried poor service delivery from the company managing their pension payment.

The company Sandulela also  takes care of pensioners, world war veterans and people living with disability.

BOPA recently visited Woodhall kgotla where pensioners had gathered for their allowance. 

A 73 year old Mr Jonas Lenkobe told the news agency they have been going back and forth to the kgotla since October 17 to collect their pension with no luck.

“We have been coming here since Monday morning and everyday there is a different story, yesterday we were told to go back home at lunch time as the workers told us they had run out of paper,” said Mr Lenkobe.

He also said using public transport every day to get to the kgotla without any good results is proving to be costly.

A 70 year old Mr Dikhutsafalo Setsiba mentioned that they get to the kgotla early in the morning only for the Sandulela workers to come late in the afternoon.

“We are here since morning without food and some of us are diabetic and we all suffer from different non-communicable diseases,” he said

Ms EsaleeneMothupi who was there on behalf of her mother, said another downside of this company is that one can only get paid at the place where they have registered, as opposed to the post office where they could get their money anywhere at any time.

For her part, Lobatse district officer, Ms Tuelo Gothaang said they are aware of the troubles that pensioners are facing with the company.

She said the company is not reliable as they did not show up on Monday.

She said another problem is that once the team has left a location to the next one, pensioners have no alternative place to access their cash and therefore have to wait for the next month to get their money.

“We are yet to send a report to our senior officials in Kanye about this issue, we are really concerned,” she said.

Sandulela director, Mr Tshepo Radikoro acknowledged that they have been experiencing some difficulties with pension funds which he said government also has a fair share in the problem.

Mr Radikoro said some pensioners are not in the payroll as they did not register with them when it was time for registration, as some were skeptical about being moved from the post office.

“Some pensioners are only coming now and they expect us to register them on the spot and issue them cards and pay them at the same time, but this is not possible as we have to go back to put them in the payroll and that is when they can start receiving their money,” Mr Radikoro revealed.

He also said police were reluctant to help them when they asked for security from them to carry cash to the customary courts.

“We cannot carry large sums of money without security, we are still waiting for the police to agree to escort us that is why we always run out of cash, we only take a certain amount because of security reasons,” he said.

Mr Radikoro further said the project is new and that the public should bear with them as things will get better. ENDS