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Mar 15th 2025 | CAPE TOWN

South Africa’s schools reflect a stark regional disparity, with the Western Cape standing alone as the only province free of dilapidated classrooms, while the Eastern Cape bears the heaviest burden. Basic Education Minister Siviwe Gwarube told parliament on March 12th that 10% of the country’s 22,529 public schools—some 2,240—are in poor or very poor condition. The Eastern Cape accounts for 1 090 of these, dwarfing other provinces like Mpumalanga and Northern Cape, where substandard facilities are also rife. KwaZulu-Natal, with 5,790 schools, fares better, its infrastructure largely sound.

Yet the rot runs deeper than numbers suggest. Many schools still lack basics—classrooms, electricity, water, toilets—while provincial budgets stagnate or shift elsewhere, stalling upgrades. Ms Gwarube, a Democratic Alliance stalwart, lamented the slow grind of delivery: vandalism and theft inflate costs, procurement snarls delay projects, and national budget cuts leave funds unspent despite the need. Gauteng and the Western Cape, swollen by growing pupil numbers, pour cash into expansion, but provinces like Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal, with vast repair backlogs, struggle to keep pace.

Migration sharpens the contrast. Between 2011 and 2021, Stats SA data show the Eastern Cape lost 6.8% of its population—some 450,000 people—while the Western Cape gained 17.5%, or roughly 1 million, many fleeing economic stagnation for better prospects. Education gaps fuel this flow: the Eastern Cape’s 1 090 crumbling schools compare dismally to the Western Cape’s pristine slate. In 2023 alone, the latter added 12,000 pupils, straining capacity but not quality—a pull factor that deepens the Eastern Cape’s woes as skilled workers and families drift westward.

This divide echoes broader fiscal strains. A recent piece in The Economist (February 22nd 2025) noted that immigration from countries with low Human Development Index scores tend to drag on public coffers. The Eastern Cape, with its poor infrastructure and 34% unemployment rate, and mass migration to the West, epitomises this burden, its schools a microcosm of underinvestment. As Ms Gwarube warned, raising VAT to plug such gaps would crush the poorest—an unsustainable fix for a nation already stretched thin.

Politics complicates the picture, rooted in South Africa’s racial voting habits. The ANC, dominant among black voters (68% of the electorate), has held sway since 1994, yet black voter turnout has slipped—down to 46% in 2024 from 66% in 2004, per the Electoral Commission. The DA, strong in the Western Cape with mixed-race and white support, governs there but lacks national clout. This absenteeism, paired with racial bloc voting, is a ticking time bomb: disillusionment festers among black communities, especially in neglected regions like the Eastern Cape, where service delivery lags. Ms Gwarube’s call for sustainable funding sidesteps this tension, but without broader political will, the education chasm may yet widen.

For 2024/25, her department plans 40 new schools—11 in the Eastern Cape, four in the Western Cape, and others scattered—but 1 461 more await repairs. Maintenance, she insists, is the priority. With fiscal pressures mounting and racial-political divides simmering, South Africa’s schoolhouses stand as both symptom and test of a fractured state.

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