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In an effort to get rid of mud schools and pit latrines, the Eastern Cape government has announced plans to fix the problem and build more schools.
The province, according to the department of education, has 1 412 schools built of inappropriate materials including mud, asbestos, planks, corrugated iron and sticks.
The provincial education department needs more than R70 billion to deal with the backlog infrastructure.
In his state of the province address this week, Premier Oscar Mabuyane promised there would be lots of work done to address the challenges of inadequate infrastructure in the schools.
Read: Eastern Cape Sopa: Mabuyane focuses on job creation; EFF booted from legislature
Mabuyane said government had committed to intensifying the rollout of the Accelerated Schools Infrastructure Delivery Initiative (Asidi) programme.
“Mud schools continue to be an eyesore in some of the villages. Government has committed to intensify the rollout of the Asidi programme and ensure that the Sanitation Appropriate for Education (Safe) programme for appropriate sanitation facilities is speedily implemented in the province.”
Following the death of five-year-old Lumka Mketwa who drowned in a pit latrine at Luna Junior Secondary School in Mbizana in 2018, President Cyril Ramaphosa launched the Safe initiative to address schools sanitation challenges, particularly in the rural provinces of the Eastern Cape, Limpopo and KwaZulu-Natal.
Read: Another pit latirine death as billion are cut from school infrastructure project
“Through the Asidi programme, 138 additional schools are going to be built, completed and handed over for use by 2024. This year, 51 schools are under construction and will come on stream in the mid-term expenditure framework with 22 planned for launch in this financial year alone,” said Mabuyane.
Meanwhile, DA spokesperson on education in the Eastern Cape, Yusuf Cassim, said Mabuyane was not in touch with reality.
“The premier is out of touch with the infrastructure problem at schools in the province. In the previous financial year the budget for school infrastructure was underspent by R100 million,” said Cassim.
He said there were a number of school infrastructure projects that were poorly managed resulting in several contractors pulling out. He cited schools in the northern areas of Port Elizabeth as an example, where contractors left because they were not being paid on time by the department.
“The sanitation programme is even worse. The Safe programme launched by the president, which was meant to eradicate unsafe toilets in the province in 1 408 schools with unsafe pit toilets, was a complete disaster as well,”he said.
“In the previous financial year they were supposed to eradicate 149 of these pit toilets and they only did 44. And in the current financial year which ends next month, they were supposed to eradicate 262 by the end of last year. But by the completion date they had not even started or employed a single implementing agent.”
However, it remains to be seen if Mabuyane’s plans will materialise after Finance Minister Tito Mboweni this week announced that education infrastructure allocations would be adjusted by R5.2 billion over the medium term.
“ he largest spending areas will be learning and culture … In the education sector, investment goes to new schools, replacing schools constructed with inappropriate materials and providing them with water, electricity and sanitation,” said Mboweni during his budget speech.
Mabuyane said education was one area they have been paying sustained attention to since the dawn of democracy hence the improvement of outcomes.
He said at the heart of the province’s education programme for this term was the implementation of the Education System Transformation Plan.
“We will ensure that we support our schools thoroughly so that every pupil reaches the ?nish line of basic education schooling. This means our schools will be resourced adequately with teachers, receive Learner Teacher Support Material on time, development of our teachers will be prioritised and our pupils will continue to be supported through the scholar transport and school nutrition programmes.”
He said his government would also pay particular attention to early childhood development (ECD), particularly the two years of exposure prior to Grade 1 and schools for pupils with special needs. He said in this regard government would ensure that 7 000 ECD centres were registered.
Provincial education spokesperson Loyiso Pulumani could not be reached for comment.
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