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Cape Argus reports that the Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF) has been slammed for being too slow to deal with 123 complaints submitted a month ago.
This was after it emerged that only 60.9% of the complaints submitted by the Western Cape legislature’s standing committee on finance, economic opportunities and tourism had been resolved. Committee chairperson Deidre Baartman (DA) said: “This means that almost 40% of applicants are still left without support whilst employment opportunities remain constrained under lockdown restrictions. It appears that UIF is building this aircraft in the air 18 months after lockdown regulations were first introduced. While it has been a massive feat to distribute more than R10 billion to the people of the Western Cape, too often enquiries still fall through the cracks.” Acting UIF commissioner Mzie Yawa admitted that his department was unprepared for the number of Covid-19 Temporary Employer-Employee Relief Scheme (Ters) applications received and that they could have handled the response to complaints from the public better and faster than they did. He said: “I agree that a month between the time we received the complaints from the committee and now, needs to be explained as to what the hold-up was. However, without also making excuses, I can say that the UIF management and staff were never geared for the pandemic and this impacted on the speed with which we did things.” The committee resolved that the UIF should submit a monthly report outlining its progress in addressing the payment of UIF and Covid-19 Ters benefits and that it should resolve the outstanding 40% enquiries by 25 August.
- Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Mwangi Githahu at Cape Argus
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