The North West legislature has given departments responsible for scholar transport until December to sort out the chaos that has resulted in pupils being forced to hitch-hike or walk long distances to school.
The Department of Community Safety and Transport Management was hauled before the provincial legislature’s portfolio committees on transport and education to account for the crisis in Mahikeng on Thursday.
The ineffectiveness of scholar transport is reported to have contributed to pupils having to rely on alternative modes of transportation.
This is believed to have resulted in absenteeism and fatigue among pupils.
The committees heard that the majority of the 446 operators who were appointed in January on a five-year term are renting buses from outside the province.
It was also revealed that most of the buses used are unroadworthy, registered in other provinces, overloaded and provide inconsistent services.
The committee heard that the department requires an additional R79-million to address some of the challenges.
Hans Kekana, head of department of the Department of Community Safety and Transport Management said they had to allow scholar transport service providers from North West to go and lease buses from other provinces because there is a huge shortage of buses in the province and in the country.
Kekana said most service -providers who hired buses were from Mahikeng. “There are no buses in Mahikeng. There is a lack of buses, even second-hand buses. Big companies have got upfront orders from big operators, and whatever they are producing today is already linked to certain companies that are in commuter bus services, especially for long distance,” he said.
Kekana said North West bus operators get buses from as far as Mpumalanga and Limpopo.
“Locality is a standard requirement. We see them having local addresses and you will only hear later that the person is not from the province.”
In Ngaka Modiri Molema District Municipality, the department appointed 163 scholar transport service providers followed by 124 in Bojanala 91 in the Dr Kenneth Kaunda district and 68 in the Dr Ruth Segomotsi Mompati district.
He said as part of the implementation of this project, a verification process was conducted from December 11 to 14 last year and from January 3 to 4.
Kekana said the department was checking whether the appointed service providers had the necessary capacity to provide transport and whether the vehicles met the minimum road and safety standards.
“Some involve submission of invoices with fraudulent school stamps and forging of the signature of the school principals.
“We are still thin on the ground to monitor all buses due to capacity and budgetary challenges. However, the envisaged use of technology will go a long way to assist the department to resolve the challenges,” he said.
The committee recommended that the department immediately revoke the contracts of contractors that are placing children’s lives in danger.
The committees also resolved that the Department of Education must commission an urgent study to locate 9 045 pupils who are not part of the scholar transport.
“It’s a very emotive issue because it speaks to the rights of learners. They are the most fragile in society. The committee is going to take a no-mercy approach on these recommendations,” said Department of Community Safety and Transport Management chairperson Freddy Sonakile.
He said the department had to come up with a method to subject all buses to roadworthy tests unannounced between now and in December and provide the legislature with findings and measures they are going to take against those that are not compliant.
Sonakile also recommended that the department must investigate the possibility of fraudulent contracts that were awarded when they were issued in January.
