Three weeks after the school term, many special schools in the province are still closed, with the KwaZulu-Natal Office of the Premier committing to resolve the issues that have prevented special needs children from attending class.
At the start of the last school term, the South African National Association for Special Education (Sanase) in the province called for the closure of special schools because of operational challenges.
Sanase highlighted funding, support staff and learner transport as pressing issues.
Last week, the Education Department announced the successful payment of Norms and Standards funding to special schools for the second quarter, however 38 schools in the province remain closed.
KwaZulu-Natal Premier Thamsanqa Ntuli’s spokesperson, Lindelani Mbatha, said that Ntuli and Education MEC Sipho Hlomuka met with Sanase leadership in Durban on Tuesday. The meeting was to understand and address the issues.
In a recent interview, Sanase KZN revealed they had handed over a memorandum to the Office of the Premier but had not received a response.
The Office of the Premier clarified that the five-month delay in responding to the memorandum was due to its referral to the Department of Education for implementation, with the Premier’s office acting in an oversight capacity.
Mbatha said the memorandum remains partially implemented, and this is due to funding shortfalls.
“The Office of the Premier has intentions to attend to the issues despite budget constraints, and a follow-up meeting with the Department of Education, Sanase, and Provincial Treasury is scheduled for next week to aggressively explore all avenues within the constrained fiscal environment,” Mbatha said.
Mbatha highlighted the actions the Premier’s office will take and their timelines:
- Funding: Confirmed that all outstanding financial allocations to schools have been processed, with the last batch completed this week.
- Support staff: In the meeting, Sanase acknowledged that the Office of the Premier committed to providing support staff for schools and indeed, 350 support staff were recruited and appointed. A meeting is scheduled for next week to address filling the remaining support staff posts (707 posts remain unfilled from the 1,057 posts originally identified).
- Learner transport: The Department of Education has committed to a plan for procuring additional buses and implementing new measures to speed up repairs.
- Dialogue: The parties committed to maintaining open and continuous communication with Sanase.
“On the future of learners missing classes, the Premier’s office states that missing vital classroom time ultimately harms those we are all striving to protect. The Premier received assurances from Sanase that learning will resume and the parties are jointly calling for the immediate reopening of schools,” Mbatha said.
Earlier this week, DA KZN education spokesperson Sakhile Mngadi said the party welcomes reports that the provincial Department of Education (DOE) has finally paid outstanding subsidies owed to schools across the province, along with the overdue July Norms and Standards tranche.
He said this development offers a much-needed reprieve for hundreds of schools that have been struggling to remain operational.
Mngadi highlighted the party’s persistent efforts to expose the severe impact of funding delays on schools, including staff payment issues, interrupted feeding schemes, and resource shortages for pupils. The party repeatedly raised these concerns with Hlomuka, tabling parliamentary questions and sending formal correspondence demanding action.
“While it is encouraging to see that the DOE has finally acted, the September tranche remains outstanding, and schools cannot afford another round of excuses or bureaucratic inertia. The DA, as a partner within KZN’s Government of Provincial Unity (GPU), will continue to monitor this closely to ensure that this payment is made without delay and that future disbursements follow the legally prescribed schedule,” Mngadi said.
“Our schools deserve predictability and accountability, not last-minute interventions driven by political pressure. KZN’s DOE must institutionalise sound financial management and respect the rights of learners and educators to a stable, functional schooling environment.”
