The ongoing crisis in KwaZulu-Natal education: A call for accountability

The recent stance from the education minister to agree to rectify and reassess the financial mismanagement and misappropriation of funds within the KwaZulu-Natal education sector has been long awaited.

The recent engagements held by politicians merely acknowledged the crisis and indicated that there is a shortfall of 7 billion Rands within the KwaZulu-Natal Department of Education. Yet, the province has been experiencing budget cuts, and a number of schools, especially within rural KwaZulu-Natal, have been earmarked to shut down because of the lack of resources to fund the operational costs and maintain the infrastructure.

The misappropriation of funds has been ongoing for many years now, and we can also note that the province could have been far more proactive in addressing this issue a long time ago. The employment of ghost teachers has been ongoing for more than a decade.

In the year 2010, there was an indication that there would be a verification process to identify and eliminate the employment of ghost teachers. Should we, as citizens, not question why they are still investigating this fraudulent activity even though an analytical verification process was put in place 15 years ago?

In 2016, there was a public media statement that declared that the education department in KwaZulu-Natal had eliminated all the ghost teachers that were identified. This is only one of many problems that the department has.

Quintile 1 to 3 schools are the most dependent on the government’s resources, as they are meant to cater to the needs of impoverished communities. Some of these schools in rural areas are not even equipped with appropriate infrastructure, such as kitchens, which has impacted their capacity to be recipients of the National School Nutrition Programme.

These schools constitute the majority of schools in the province but probably have the most ghost teachers employed. A broad data search does not verify which quintile schools have the highest and lowest ratios of ghost teachers employed.

But more importantly, these schools are meant to be equipped to arm our children and teenagers with adequate education so that, as adults one day, they can elevate themselves from their impoverished circumstances.

Minister Gwarube has agreed to place a short-term and long-term financial system in place so that the operations of the schools continue to serve our people.

Ongoing investigations and a systematic evaluation process are needed for KwaZulu-Natal, and we also need to assess and verify how other provinces have been managing the downscaling of fraudulent activities.

Gauteng has not been without incidents of fraud either, but their stringent recourse to deal with these incidents has assisted the department. In 2021, the SIU investigation uncovered unlawfully spent funds to the value of R431 million rands.

The Special Investigation Unit indicated that officials had bypassed the regulated procurement process and were thereafter held accountable. The SIU froze the assets of these companies, and the officials have been suspended.

However, all provinces have been guilty of delaying justice and related protocols. Four years later, the public still awaits the finalisation of this corruption case. In 2024, the Western Cape too experienced tender corruption, which was revealed by an external auditing team.

The tender was to the value of more than 1 billion rands with the purpose of extending IT services and web connectivity across schools in the province. Media reports have not indicated how far the investigation is at present and what measures have been put in place accordingly to rectify this.

It is rather disturbing that here we are, as a democracy, and are still battling with so many corruption and fraudulent activities within government structures of South Africa.

The purpose of our education system is to develop our society so that collectively we can address high levels of poverty.

The future of so many children is being taken away from them through these criminal activities and creates a difficult and unequal divide within our country.

Children that attend semi-private and private schools are going to continue on a path that will ultimately lead them to a successful future.

Educational opportunities play a pivotal role in the development and progress of any child. These formative years shape and prepare the mind for their adult years, and we, as a nation, need to realise the big impact of fraudulent activity within the Department of Education.

We can now eagerly await further information about how these departments can be restructured so that there is no room for such criminality in the near future.

DAILY NEWS