EC Mud Schools: A watermark case that could redefine education in SA

There is a deeply significant court case about to take place, which goes to the very heart of education in South Africa and the ANC government's approach to it. Seven ‘mud' schools in the Eastern Cape's O.R. Tambo district municipality have taken the national, provincial and local governments to court, over the their failure to provide adequate resources for those schools. The seven schools argue this is in violation of the Constitutionally-enshrined right to a basic education and thus, ultimately, the case will no doubt be headed to the Constitutional Court and, if their application is upheld, the implications will be far reaching.

Most importantly, the application will force the court - ultimately the Constitutional Court - to quantify the right to a basic education. In other words, to say what it means in real terms (each child should have access to a classroom, water and sanitation, a teacher etc). This has never been done before. If the application is successful it will force the courts to determine a benchmark against which other schools across the country can be held and the implications of that, are enormous. All schools which fail to comply with that benchmark would too be in breach of the constitution.

This could well be a watershed case in South Africa: a formal and considered definition of criteria must be met by government in order for it to fulfill its obligation in terms of this constitutional right. For a country ravaged by decades of poor education - a situation that has not improved under the ANC administration, post 1994 - this case is deeply significant. It represents a chance for the poorest of the poor and those people whose future depends on the state's performance in this regard, to gauge what the government of the day has delivered.

By way of background, the right to basic education is a progressively realized right. That is, it is not a first generation right, like the right to Freedom of Expression. And so the government has an obligation to realise the right to basic education over time. The seven schools are arguing that it has failed to do, and that it has reasonable time to comply.

On paper they appear to have a very strong case. As far back as 2004 President Mbeki promised that "By the end of this financial year we shall ensure that there is no learner and student learning under a tree, mud-school or any dangerous conditions that expose learners and teachers to the elements." That promise has not been met.

Certainly the Eastern Cape provincial education department is in a state of advance disarray. It received yet another damning report from the Auditor-General this year, the latest of many. So bad, in fact, that the ANC itself admitted the department had "totally collapsed". A recent provincial treasury report revealed that the Eastern Cape education department will likely overspend its budget by R1.9 billion in 2010/11. The report recommended freezing infrastructure projects, including the upgrade of 395 "unsafe" schools, and the construction of new buildings for the mud schools. If this spending moratorium happens, the children at these schools will have to face yet another year without proper facilities.

The OR Tambo district municipality, which is supposed to provide water to these schools, spent only 60% of its R488 million Municipal Infrastructure Grant last year. It left untouched R195 million which could have been used to provide water to these schools. Such provincial overspending and local underspending have combined to deprive thousands of students their rights.

And, while this application deal with the material resources that should be made available to schools, there is another perhaps more important issue that should be addressed: and that is the quality of the education being taught. Obviously every learner should have proper access to the right facilities and infrastructure, in order to make teaching more effective, but of primary importance is what is being taught. And this is perhaps the ANC government's biggest failing: an inability to deal properly with those teachers who are failing to ensure the our children are receiving the best possible education.

No doubt the courts will not be called up to quantify what constitutes a ‘basic education' in this sense, but it is an exercise the government would do well to undertake, because the results will be alarming.

The DA will be following this case closely.

I will be visiting these mud schools in the Eastern Cape soon, then visiting other poorly-resourced schools in Limpopo, Mpumalanga and the North West to investigate the state of our public schools. I have already asked for a meeting with the Minister of Basic Education, Angie Motshekga, to discuss these urgent matters with her. Considering that tomorrow is World Teacher's Day, we owe it to our teachers and learners to support their efforts for a quality education for all.

Statement issued by Wilmot James, MP, Democratic Alliance shadow minister of basic education, October 4 2010

Click here to sign up to receive our free daily headline email newsletter