Social Development Minister Bathabile Dlamini skipped yet another parliamentary committee meeting to discuss the impending South Africa Social Security Agency (Sassa) grants crisis.
The social development portfolio committee hosted the South African Reserve Bank on Wednesday, to get an update on how it was helping the takeover of social grants payments from current service provider Cash Paymaster Services (CPS).
Dlamini sent her apologies to acting chairperson Hope Malgas, saying she was attending the regular Cabinet meeting.
Department director-general Zane Dangor and an executive manager from Sassa were in attendance.
Committee chairperson Rose Capa was away in Uganda on official duties.
Dlamini skipped a standing committee on public accounts (Scopa) meeting to account for the social grants crisis on Tuesday, saying she was chairing a social services cluster press briefing elsewhere in Parliament.
Dlamini told journalists at the briefing that she was only accountable to the portfolio committee on social development, and not to Scopa, and therefore did not have to attend.
The Reserve Bank is expected to update the committee on its role in the implementation of Sassa's institutionalisation of the grants payment system.
On Wednesday, Sassa withdrew its application to the Constitutional Court for an extension of a social grants distribution contract it ruled "invalid" and "unconstitutional" in 2014.