The finance ministry paid out more than N$110 million to 146 974 Namibians on Wednesday who applied for the Emergency Income Grant.

Tonateni Shindhudhu, the finance ministry spokesperson said the payments were supposed to have been done on Tuesday this week but were delayed because of the verification.

Shidhudhu said 327 528 applications were received when the SMS line was opened last week Friday, while 180 554 were rejected.

According to Shidhudu, a number of fraudulent and suspicious applications were picked up and these included multiple entries of ID numbers, applications for deceased persons and those appearing on the NSFAF, Social Security Commission and Veteran Affairs database.

There were 242 applications made using ID numbers that belong to deceased persons and 57 applications were rejected as ID numbers were found in the records of the veteran grants.

Stolen ID users were also blocked by the ministry while 31 846 applications were rejected after they were found in taxpayers records.

Shidhudhu said criminal charges will be laid against those who have falsely claimed benefits under this scheme while recovery procedures for false claims will be made.