Cracks in classrooms stoke new fears
● In the wake of the deaths of four pupils at Hoërskool Driehoek in Vanderbijlpark, it has emerged that Limpopo does not have money to do urgent maintenance at 168 schools.
In the financial year that ends in March, Limpopo earmarked R22m for school maintenance, compared with R76m by the Free State, R166m by Northern Cape, R287m by Western Cape and R255.5m by Gauteng.
Limpopo has 3,801 schools — 2,603 more than the Free State — but its maintenance budget for the past five financial years was only R180m. The Free State budgeted R478m for its 1,198 schools. Over the same period, the Northern Cape, which has 556 schools, allocated more than R669m.
The Western Cape spent almost R1.9bn on maintenance in the past five financial years while Gauteng spent R1.8bn and a further R2.3bn on rehabilitation projects.
Limpopo education department spokesperson Sam Makondo said 88 schools were in “a state of dilapidation”. He said the 168 schools needing urgent maintenance would only receive attention after March next year.
Free State education department spokesperson Howard Ndaba said 35 schools were due to be renovated and 67 with structural defects had been repaired between April 2017 and last March.
Ndaba said that six dilapidated schools were receiving urgent attention.
The Northern Cape education department said it still had a maintenance backlog. Three of its schools have been rated as very poor, 136 as poor and 271 as fair.
Western Cape education department spokesperson Bronagh Casey said the province’s challenge was replacing 100 “plankie” schools built during apartheid.
“We are trying to completely replace these structures with brick and mortar,” she said.
Since April 2012, 65 “plankie” schools had
been replaced.
In Gauteng, engineers this week deemed 18 classrooms at Hoërskool Roodepoort structurally unsafe, according to the South African Teachers Union.
The union’s director of operations, Johan Kruger, said the report indicated that new cracks had formed in floors and walls “further undermining the integrity of the building”.
A maths lecturer who teaches in D block at Ekurhuleni West Technical & Vocational Education & Training College’s Kempton Park campus stopped using the classroom this week because of fears that a huge crack in the wall could lead to the building collapsing.
The Sunday Times has learnt that the lecturer has been scrambling to find empty classrooms in other buildings to teach.
An office occupied by a former head of the engineering division, which was attached to the building, was abandoned about three years ago because of safety concerns.
A student said the lecturer was teaching in other classrooms. The lecturer declined to comment,
“After the tragedy at Hoërskool Driehoek, we are afraid of sitting in the classroom that has a huge crack as we do not feel safe there,” the student said.
Another lecturer sent an e-mail to the acting principal, Ntombizodwa Dangazele, on Tuesday expressing concern over the crack, which was reported three years ago.
He suggested to Dangazele that five mobile classrooms be bought or hired to accommodate five class groups “to reduce the weight” of the building.
In an e-mailed response, Dangazele told the Sunday Times that a report last November by civil and structural engineers said the crack “does not indicate any danger to persons. The professionals are busy finalising the tender document for the appointment of contractors for the remedial work.”