Grannies who are recipients of State grants are struggling to retain their meagre allowance due to illegal money lenders or ‘mashonisas’.
This according to a representative of local non-governmental organisation Kidz Clinic, Elizabeth Mokoena, who said they attended to many grannies daily complaining about a range of human rights abuses in the community, but most of all about their exploitation by illegal money lenders.
“Grannies are vulnerable to common crime daily due to their physical weakness, and are most vulnerable to illegal money lenders after receiving their grants and pensions at month-end,” she said.
“Their payments are very small and get exhausted by mid-month, forcing them to borrow for their own and dependents’ upkeep.
“Most of these grannies are old and illiterate with no useful extended family system, and fall victim to loan enticements which have to be repaid with huge interest, which they cannot afford.”
To ensure repayments, Mokoena said the money-lenders confiscated the grannies’ Identity Documents and bank cards, and often demanded repayments with huge interest way above the regulated limit.
“Always from the 1st to the 10th of every month, [mashonisas] wait for [the grannies] at the SanKopano community centre pay point for the repayments, often leaving them with very little,” she said.
Mokoena added that they also took advantage of the old women as they couldn’t access loans from registered money-lending institutions because of their unemployment and low income.
“This business is illegal and a crime but continues unabated, and in some instances results in deaths of grannies due to stress from worry,” she said. She appealed to family members to accompany the grannies to pay points and to the police to assist in retrieving their IDs and bank cards.
Also, she stressed a need for campaigns to educate the elderly on privacy and the protection of the State documents issued to them, as not having IDs could lead to loss of access to other essential services.
Details: 011 321 7614/5.
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