The department had to surrender the money to the National Treasury and it was then given to the Eastern Cape instead. The department’s spokesperson, Elias Malindi, tells OFM News MEC, Sello Lehari, has been engaging with senior executives of the department with the hope of establishing as to what went wrong. Meanwhile, the Democratic Alliance(DA) says the department spent a mere 51% of their total grant in this financial year, despite the fact that the 104 schools in the province are still using pit latrines, with issues of insufficient sanitation and unsafe buildings. Malindi says the department will pronounce on its position soon.

DA party leader in the province, Joe McGluwa, says during the budget speech earlier this month,  the MEC for the Department of Finance, Wendy Matsemela, announced that the Department of Education needs to “pay attention to planning, reporting as well as capacitation to ensure that they do not lose future conditional grant allocations including performance-incentive grants,” McGluwa says. He adds that this remark clearly indicates the lack of confidence in the ability of the Department of Education to adequately manage the people’s money in ensuring quality education for all.

OFM News