LOUIS TRICHARDT – Seriously ill, elderly and disabled people sat waiting for more than six hours at the Tshikota pension pay-out point this week, not knowing when or if the pay-out team would be arriving.

Although the community hall had been unlocked for shelter, only the ladies' toilets were accessible. The men's toilets remained locked for the duration of the wait, and an unsanitary situation, posing a public health risk, developed as people had to relieve themselves in the open in front of the locked toilet doors.

There was no visible presence of either the local municipality or of the Department of Health and Welfare.

The conditions at the payout point have repeatedly been brought to the attention of the relevant authorities.

"Why must helpless people be punished to receive their pensions?" asked one bystander.

In the past, when the treatment of pensioners at this payout point was eventually brought to the attention of the Provincial Department of Health, the only reaction was an official reply that the situation was totally unacceptable.