Some social workers, who graduated using the Limpopo Social Development Department’s bursary scheme since 2014, accuse the department of reneging on its contractual agreement to employ them. They complain that since they qualified, most have been offered three to 12 months contracts, while others never got any opportunity.
“The agreement on that was that when I complete my studies I will be absorbed to serve the department the number of years which will be equivalent to the number of years which I have been financed to study. So I’m very hurt for seeing what the department is doing with us, enough is enough. We are suffering, we don’t get anything, now we have to go into contracts for three months you are helping clients, the next thing you are in the queue applying for Sassa.”
The disgruntled unemployed social workers have accused the Limpopo Social Development Department of ignoring their grievances for a long time. Most of them recently marched to the department’s head office in Polokwane demanding answers.
They have also raised concerns that they are rejected when they apply for other opportunities because they are still registered in the government system.
“The other thing is that when we have the contract they give us a personnel number, so when we apply for some jobs it disadvantages us because they tell us we are in the government payroll. When we apply for the R350 for unemployed it says you don’t qualify because you are on a government payroll, whereas with the personnel number we have never got a full salary with it, but it’s preventing us from getting employment or from qualifying for grants.”
The department says 1 259 social workers have graduated with honors degrees through the bursary scheme in the past five years. But it has denied that it has a contractual obligation to absorb them.
Spokesperson Witness Tiva says the department has instead undertaken to prioritise the bursary recipients when there are vacancies.
“We previously took a decision to take them to institutions of higher learning as a way of empowering them. What we have been doing was to ensure that as and when vacancies become available, we would then prioritise them. We had developed a three-year recruitment plan and unfortunately, the plan did not proceed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. As the department, we had to redirect funds towards the COVID-19 intervention. This means that the number of social workers that we were intending to employ will then be shifted to the coming financial year.”
Tiva says the province has now appointed 115 social workers on contract, as part of the national department’s COVID-19 intervention programme. He adds that a further 210 have been placed on a 12-month internship programme.
