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Education budget cuts — Gwarube targets graft, SOE bailouts, seeks urgent finance minister meeting

Education budget cuts — Gwarube targets graft, SOE bailouts, seeks urgent finance minister meeting
Lisakanya Venna
By Lisakanya Venna
25 Sep 2024
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On Wednesday, Basic Education Minister Siviwe Gwarube briefed the media about overall budget shortfalls in education for the first time since controversy erupted over planned teacher cuts a few weeks ago.

Minister of Basic Education Siviwe Gwarube has requested an urgent meeting with the finance minister on a way forward regarding budget cuts in education.

Gwarube pointed to slow economic growth at below 1%, corruption and an increase in school enrolments as pressures on schooling budgets.

The DA minister in the government of national unity highlighted the stresses and strains on the system during a media briefing in Pretoria on the provincial impact of the budget cuts, and an update on key interventions needed to resolve the education sector.

“Our education system is under immense pressure,” she said.

Read more: ‘The system is going to collapse’ – Union warns Western Cape over plans to slash 2,400 teaching posts

“Nationally, the number of learners within the education system have increased by about 292,820 over the last five years,” she said, warning that pupil/teacher ratios have also steadily increased across most provinces. 

“An increase in learners’ number without increasing the post basket, may affect the quality of teaching which may soon be reflected in the performance of the system.”

Gwarube also pointed to the bailout of state-owned enterprises that had put pressure on Treasury budgets and highlighted the need for a realignment of spending priorities. “Between 2013 and 2023, the government spent R331-billion bailing out state-owned enterprises… R331-billion could have been directed to critical sectors such as education.”

In response to concerns about education posts in the country, the minister said that despite the increase in pupil numbers, posts had decreased over the past three years. “It is important to note that these have been cuts in posts but not warm bodies – meaning that no person gets retrenched but rather vacancies are not filled.”

Affected provinces 


Revealing the national picture of the budget shortfall, the chief financial officer in the Department of Basic Education, Patrick Khunou, said the pressure across all nine provinces is a minimum of R79-billion. This could be as high as R1,018-billion from the 2021-22 financial year through to the 2027/28 financial years.   

The minimum amount reflected the fact that some provinces had not provided full figures for the full number of years in question.

Provincial breakdown

  • KwaZulu-Natal leads with the highest shortfall, at R26.7-billion minimum up to R38.9-billion;

  • Gauteng: R20-billion;

  • Mpumalanga: R4.3-billion to R17.2-billion;

  • Eastern Cape: R11.8-billion;

  • Free State, which gave out information up to the year ending 26/27, has a shortfall of R7.7-billion to R9.7-billion;

  • Western Cape: R4.4-billion to R6.3-billion;

  • Northern Cape: R2.2-billion to R8.5-billion;

  • North West: R6,092-million to R2.7-billion; and

  • Limpopo: R5,046-million to R2.1-billion.


The provincial details follow the announcement by Western Cape education MEC David Maynier a few weeks ago that the department is facing a budget shortfall and would need to cut posts. 

The full details of the provincial impact follows a meeting Gwarube held with the members of the executive council (MECs) from all nine provinces and Treasury, which was supported by her party, the DA, on 19 September to address the pressing issue of financial support for education.

This also comes after the postponement of a committee meeting on the briefing/presentation on the impact and implications of budget cuts and declaration posts by all nine provincial education departments, initially set for 18 September and rescheduled for Tuesday, 29 October. 

The cuts have left many teaching posts hanging in the balance in a number of provinces, sparking widespread concern in provinces like KwaZulu-Natal where 11,000 teaching jobs are at risk of being cut. In the Western Cape, 2,407 contract posts are at risk of non-renewal in 2025, which sparked protest by the Western Cape Education Crisis Committee.

Read more: ‘We won’t stop soon’ — Education Crisis Committee say ‘no to budget cuts’ in Western Cape schools picketing

Union's view


The spokesperson for the National Professional Teachers’ Organisation of South Africa, Basil Manuel, said they plan to meet the nine MECs and Treasury on 9 and 10 October to discuss a way forward following the outcome of Thursday’s meeting, adding that they “still don’t have a single picture of the whole country and we will only have that by the 9th”. DM

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