Father decries latrine plans

President announces proposals to eradicate pit toilets at a cost of R6.8bn

Vuyani Mkethwa, father of the five-year-old Eastern Cape schoolgirl Lumka Mkethwa who died after falling into a pit latrine at her school, says President Cyril Ramaphosa’s plan to eradicate school pit toilets came a little too late to save his daughter.

The Dispatch spoke to Mkethwa on Monday afternoon, a few hours after Ramaphosa announced government’s plan to do away with pit latrines.

Mkethwa said: “If only government did the right thing in the first place, my daughter would still be alive today. They waited for someone to die and that someone was my little girl. So for me this plan means nothing,” said Mkethwa.

The president’s sanitation appropriate for education (SAFE) plan, comes less than six months after Lumka fell and died in a pit toilet at her school, Luna Primary in Mbizana.

It also comes four years after the death in 2014 of five-yearold, Michael Komape , who fell and died in a pit latrine at his Limpopo school.

In a nutshell, the plan seeks to appeal to corporates, NGOs and international organisations to partner with government and support the construction of new technology toilets, and for companies to adopt a group of schools for a combined solution to sanitation, water, and offgrid solutions.

These projects must use minimal or no water.

Spokesperson for Education lobby group, Equal Education (EE), Leanne Jansen-Thomas, said it was difficult to reconcile the SAFE initiative, as the state has lodged an appeal against a Bhisho High Court ruling that compelled department of basic education Minister Angie Motshekga to meet the deadline to fix school infrastructure.

Last month, the court ruled in favour of EE’s application to force Motshekga to fix the “loopholes” or “escape clauses” in the legislated minimum norms and standards for school infrastructure and to meet school infrastructure deadlines.

The court ruled that some of the regulations in the norms and standards for school infrastructure that the government promulgated five years ago were unconstitutional, invalid and needed to be amended.

According to Jansen-Thomas, the state argued it was not obliged to urgently fix schools.

“Nevertheless, EE will carefully study the proposed intervention,” said Jansen-Thomas.

DBE spokesman Elijah Mhlanga yesterday confirmed that their appeal was lodged on Friday.

According to the most recent school sanitation audit that was conducted by the Department of Basic Education (DBE), as per the president’s instruction after the death of Lumka, it would cost government more than R6.8-billion to eradicate pit latrines at schools throughout SA.

The bulk of that budget, more than R2.5-billion, is needed for the Eastern Cape, the province with the highest number schools with pit latrines.

The sanitation audit indicates there are 3,898 schools with pit latrines in the country.

The Eastern Cape tops the list with 1,598 schools, followed by KwaZulu-Natal at 1,365 schools and Limpopo has 507.

The only three provinces that have no schools with pit latrines are Gauteng, Northern Cape and the Western Cape.

The Eastern Cape is also the only province with schools without any toilets.

Speaking during the launch of the plan on Monday morning, Ramaphosa said the operation was in response to the emergency of pit latrines.

“These are the schools that serve the children of the poor. It was in such a school, that Michael Komape drowned in a pit toilet in 2014. And it was in such a school where Lumka Mkethwa lost her life in March this year.

“The utterly tragic and devastating deaths of children so young and so innocent remind us of the human consequences of service delivery delayed,” he said.

If Govt did right thing in first place, my daughter would be alive today