SHONGWE – The Democratic Alliance (DA) has released pictures of the infrastructure which is already falling apart at the Shongwe Boarding School in Nkomazi Local Municipality(NLM).
Our learners are being denied safe and dignified living conditions by a Department which does not care. In the hostels, taps were leaking, basins were blocked or broken and many of the toilets did not flush. flush.
In the dormitories, cupboard doors were falling off, light switches are broken and live wires are hanging off the ceiling, putting the lives of learners at risk. Multiple broken beds were piled up outside a building of which the ceiling was broken in some of its passages. The school’s sports field was also in a bad condition.
The school boasts a computer with very good security, but according to learners, the computers were stored in boxes in another room as there was nobody to teach them as how to use it. The school library had no books and the laboratory was not stocked.
According to the Department of Education’s annual performance plan for the 2013/14 financial year, the estimated project cost for Shongwe Boarding School was R60 million. The school accommodates 580 learners from eight neighbouring farm schools which have been closed and merged to form this new boarding school.
Ms Sonja Boshoff, DA Member of Parliament and political head of Mbombela and Nkomazi have sent a letter to the Education MEC, requesting an urgently account of the expenditure of the R60 million to the Education Committee in the Legislature, as well as a maintenance plan for the school.
