Alberton Home Affairs grievances escalated

Following numerous complaints from disgruntled residents, Alberton councillors and MP Tsholofelo Bodlani visited Alberton Home Affairs unannounced on February 4.

The visit was to ensure Alberton Home Affairs works optimally without any backlogs and to further investigate allegations posed against them.

It came to the group’s attention that there are people who queue for others and sell that space for about R100 or so. The group also noted people standing in long queues and demanded to know the underlying issues leading to this, with the institution’s management.

Those present included Ward 37 councillor Ivan Naidoo, PR councillor Tiaan Kotzé and Ward 106 councillor Tim Denny, alongside Nina McFarlane and Bodlani.

Bodlani assured that these grievances will be escalated to parliament level and more stakeholders will be involved in bringing a solution.

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“If we get the EMPD as a stakeholder, they will assist with social distancing. But most importantly, the EMPD will assist with ghost queues because there have been reports of people who queue for others and sell that space. The stakeholder’s meeting will look at ways of making the manager’s job easier,” she said.

Bodlani said, according to the manager, Alberton Home Affairs is one of the best-performing home affairs offices in terms of revenue.

“The biggest question is: What plans do the department have to take services closer to the people? People need to come here from Thokoza and surrounding areas,” she said.

Denny told the RECORD these grievances have been reported for at least four years.

“Leadership in this place needs to be looked at because it is failing the community. The manager told us they were 11 people short and assured us there weren’t any illegal dealings occurring inside the facility. He said he needs help with security and that people sometimes get unruly,” he said.

Kesha Govender, from Meyersdal, who had needed her child’s unabridged birth certificate for school enrolment later in 2021, said it was not a feasible process.

“When I got here, the queues had been very long, and we stood in the heat. It’s terrible, especially for the elderly. There were people in the queue asking for bribes for us to stand in front of the queues, for maybe an R100 or so. I finally got the certificate today through the help of councillors after 11 weeks,” she said.

In an exclusive interview, Golden Malatji of Alberton Home Affairs, previously told the RECORD services are adequately delivered, although there are factors that contribute to people’s complaints.

“I have received the complaint of people paying money and I’ve interfered. But public members are the ones who condone this thing. We discourage them from paying any money. We work on a service charter, and services here are rendered on a first come, first serve basis,” he said.

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