SRD grant legal battle heads to Supreme Court of Appeal – SABC News – Breaking news, special reports, world, business, sport coverage of all South African current events. Africa’s news leader.
The legal battle over the Social Relief of Distress (SRD) grant is moving to the Supreme Court of Appeal in Bloemfontein on 25 August.
The government is appealing a scathing High Court judgment that declared key aspects of the grant’s administration unconstitutional and exclusionary.
Civil society organisations, including PayTheGrants and the Institute for Economic Justice (IEJ), say they are ready to defend the ruling, arguing that the high levels of poverty and unemployment have left millions hungry.
A landmark judgment handed down in January last year by Gauteng High Court Judge Leonard Twala, who found key aspects of the grant’s administration to be irrational, exclusionary, and unconstitutional.
Civil society groups Pay The Grants and the Institute for Economic Justice say the current online-only system unfairly locks out roughly 14% of eligible beneficiaries who lack internet access. They say it is deeply unfortunate that government has chosen to appeal rather than fix the system.
“The government has unfortunately chosen to appeal this ruling rather than implement it. This leaves over 16 million impoverished adults in limbo, not knowing if the defects in the SRD grant administration will be fixed anytime soon, and not knowing whether they will be able to access their right to social assistance. National Treasury argues, and you may have seen in recent media reports these arguments being put forward, that complying with the ruling would be unaffordable to the fiscus,” says Institute for Economic Justice Advocate, Dr Kelle Howson.
SASSA CEO Mr Themba Matlou, in his media interview, at the Ga-Molepo ICROP, in Limpopo today emphasizing the importance of grant reviews and the need for beneficiaries to respond and and show up to offices when requested.
He also outlines measures SASSA is taking to ensure… pic.twitter.com/u62Zyg3W1J
— SASSA (@OfficialSASSA) August 14, 2026
The SRD grant was introduced by government in 2020 following the covid-19 pandemic which left many without jobs.
The grant is meant to offer financial help, however, the Institute for Economic Justice says despite the increase in the grant, it is not nearly enough to buy food.
“The second issue in the grant case, in the SRD case, is the grant value and the means test thresholds. When the grant was introduced in 2020, the value was set at R350. It has subsequently been increased to R370, but despite that increase, it has fallen well behind the cost of living. We have had high inflation, particularly high food inflation, over the last several years. So the grant now buys much less food than it did when it was introduced in 2020. If it had kept pace with headline inflation, its value would now be over R470,” says Adv. Howson.
Other issues raised by the civil societies include the non payment of approved beneficiaries. The Institute says about 10 to 15% of approved beneficiaries are not paid, each month. This is based on its most recent data that it has accessed from South African Social Security Agency (SASSA).