Under-fire Social Development Minister Bathabile Dlamini has announced that Pearl Bhengu has been appointed interim chief executive of the SA Social Security Agency (Sassa) following the termination of the contract of Thokozani Magwaza.
Bhengu has been serving as the Sassa regional manager in KwaZulu-Natal since 2012. The department said Dlamini had met Sassa staff yesterday to inform them of the decision.
“The minister stated that the first priority of the acting CEO is to stabilise the agency and to ensure that it focuses on its constitutional mandate of administering and paying social grants in line with the Sassa Act.”
The announcement comes a day after the minister ended Magwaza’s contract. Magwaza had been at loggerheads with Dlamini over the handling of the grant payment debacle and Magwaza was reportedly in the process of negotiating with the SA Post Office to pay grants when he was fired on Monday.
Magwaza, who had cancelled millions of rand worth of illegal work stream contracts, had also allegedly received death threats.
Earlier this week, Scopa accused Dlamini of pushing Magwaza out of his job.