ANC MPs contribute R5.3m to the Covid-19 solidarity fund

The ANC's parliamentary caucus will contribute just over R5.3m to the solidarity fund established to fight Covid-19.

The governing party's caucus held its first virtual meeting on Friday where it decided that its ordinary MPs would each contribute 10% of their salaries to the fund for three months. Members of President Cyril Ramaphosa's executive and parliament's presiding officers announced last week that they would be contributing a third of their salaries for the same period to the fund.

After Friday's meeting, ANC chief whip Pemmy Majodina said they had taken seriously the country's need for resources to fight Covid-19 which was spreading fast. “It is against that background that ANC MPs are going to contribute a sum of R5,374,730,” she said.

The ANC has 259 MPs including members of the executive.

Majodina said the meeting welcomed the socio-economic stimulus package presented by Ramaphosa this week, saying the party's MPs had been on the ground and all the issues of hunger, poverty and underdevelopment raised from their constituencies had been addressed by the announcement.

Majodina said the caucus had requested the government to tighten the guidelines as to who would benefit from the R350 a month poverty relief scheme for unemployed South Africans, saying this needed clear household profiling to avoid misuse, fraudulent processes and any other corrupt practices.

“We must make sure that because it is going to take longer to deal with Covid-19, whatever resources we have, we use them effectively,” she said.

The meeting also served as a commemoration for Oliver Tambo, the ANC's longest-serving president who died on this day 27 years ago.