By Gcina Ntsaluba
Six months after a Makhanda High Court order mandating the Eastern Cape Department of Education (DoE) and Department of Transport to provide scholar transport to qualifying learners, 22 000 children still cannot get to school.
The crisis has exposed deep systemic failures in how the provincial government manages scholar transport, with officials admitting they lack accurate data and have been operating on unverified information for years.
“We are ferrying 103-thousand learners as this stands against a demand of 135-thousand, meaning that there are nearly 22-thousand in need,” said Unathi Binqose, the Eastern Cape Department of Transport spokesperson.
“We’re working closely with EC DoE as they are the ones who know the learners and the schools, and with treasury in the province to source funds to cater for those learners and schools we would have received from our colleagues at education”
“Applications for scholar transport were not done directly to Transport, as it is our colleagues who’ll know the schools and the learners better than we ever will. But we are working together to process those,” he said.
The EC DoE has failed to answer questions sent by Grocott’s Mail.
Court order ignored
In a meeting held on 13 June in East London with Legal Resource Centre (LRC), deputy directors from both departments revealed they had failed to comply with multiple court order requirements, including submitting comprehensive donor tables, establishing appeals processes, and providing monthly progress reports.
“We’re six months down the line and they still haven’t produced the data,” said Cameron McConnachie of the LRC, which brought the case to court.
“They were being very tardy. The reports were coming in late, and it was clear they were having real difficulty gathering the data they needed,” he said.
The court order specifically required the departments to submit detailed tables of all learners who had applied for scholar transport, clarify who was being transported, provide reasons for rejections, and establish an appeals process with monthly reporting requirements.
Verification process reveals shocking gaps
The Department of Transport has undertaken a verification process of all data provided by the Department of Education, revealing the extent of the problem. By 13 June, they had verified only 37% of the data.
However, this verification process has yielded some positive results. Officials identified excess capacity on existing routes and accommodated 8 700 children on existing transport services.
“It’s distressing that it had been going on for so long, but it’s definitely a positive outcome that they’re doing this process properly for the first time,” said McConnachie.
Flawed data collection system
The investigation revealed fundamental flaws in how scholars’ transport needs are assessed. The Department of Education accepts information that schools and principals provide without verification, recording it on the South African School Administration and Management Systems (SASAMS).
Schools record whether children receive transport as “approved” or “pending.” Still, there’s no checking of basic qualification criteria, such as whether learners live more than the required five kilometres from school or attend their nearest school.
“Principals often don’t really know if the child qualifies,” the LRC representative explained. “We are aware of schools that put in children that are three kilometers away, but they just think it’s far. They don’t actually know how far it is.”
Quota system prioritises budget over need
Instead of prioritising learners based on need or distance, the departments use a “quota system” that distributes transport based on available budget rather than actual requirements.
“They see what the budget is, and then they distribute that budget to different schools,” officials explained. “They say, okay, we’re going to give you 60 kids at this school, 100 kids at that school. That school gets 20.”
This approach forces schools to make difficult choices about which learners to prioritise, with most schools favouring Grade 12 students over younger learners.
Departments not aligned
The June meeting also revealed that the Department of Education and the Department of Transport are “clearly not on the same page,” with the Transport department expressing frustration at receiving unverified data from Education.
The Transport department receives data so late in the school year that they can only begin making transport decisions in the first term, severely limiting their ability to plan effectively.
Next steps
The LRC is considering applying for an independent body to conduct a systems review if the departments continue to fail to comply with the court order. This would involve appointing an independent assessor to evaluate the current system and make recommendations for improvement.
The LRC plans to seek funding for a two-month investigation, including technological improvements, training for principals on distance verification, and timeline adjustments to ensure the Transport department receives data earlier in the school year.
Officials have expressed confidence that additional funding will be forthcoming once accurate data is provided, though advocates remain sceptical given the delays experienced to date.
The case is being pursued by Kula Development, representing all learners without transport, alongside the three specific schools that brought the original application.
The crisis highlights the urgent need for systematic reform in how the Eastern Cape manages scholar transport, as thousands of children continue to miss school or face dangerous journeys to access their right to education.
