21 Jul 2019

 The Remote Area Service Allowance (RASA) is paid to officers who are stationed at areas which are 30 kilometers or more from the supply centre with no regular transport where there are no tarred roads.

Answering a question in Parliament Minister for Presidential Affairs, Governance and Public Administration,  Mr Nonofo Molefhi said that RASA was also paid where the village or settlement was 150 kilometers or more from the supply centre with regular transport where the road to the supply centre is tarred.

In this regard, he said the villages of Dagwi, Changate, and Goshwe were not eligible for RASA because they do not meet the current criteria for qualification.

Mr Molefhi further said district and sub-district were used as supply centres, therefore Goshwe was 19 km from Tutume and was disqualified by the fact that it was less than 30 km from the supply centre.

Dagwi,he said was 48 km from Tutume, and as such it did not qualify, because it was less than 150 km from supply centre with only six km gravel road.

Additionally, Minister Molefhi said that Changate was 32 km from Tutume with 10 km on gravel from the Nkange turnoff and therefore it did not meet the criteria because it was less than 150 km from the supply centre.

He said the last review for RASA was done in 2013, adding that a holistic review of criteria would be undertaken by DPSM during the last quarter of 2019/20 financial year.

MP for Nkange, Mr Edwin Batshu had asked the minister to explain why public employees stationed at villages of Dagwi, Changate, and Goshwe did not earn RASA despite remoteness of the villages. Ends