The Democratic Alliance welcomes that Premier Oscar Mabuyane has taken our suggestion of shifting funds from other Departments to support the dysfunctional Scholar Transport Programme to heart.

Premier Mabuyane held a special executive council meeting this weekend after receiving correspondence from the DA last Wednesday calling for a special adjustment budget to secure funding for the programme. Reports indicate that interim budget relief of R90,37 million has been approved.

See letter attached.

This is a much-needed intervention for the forty thousand learners stranded without scholar transport, who can now get to school.

The DA has consistently highlighted the plight of learners across the province that the scholar transport programme abandoned. We highlighted the budget shortfalls when the initial budget was tabled and called for more funding during last year’s adjustment budget. Together with community organisations, we also arranged to transport hundreds of learners from the Sea Vista community to school when their scholar transport failed to materialise.

The next step is for Finance MEC Mlungisi Mvoko to table an adjustment budget to allocate the interim funding to the scholar transport programme.

While it is not yet clear where the funding will come from, the DA pointed out that non-core expenditure across provincial departments in the 2023/24 financial year amounted to over R1.1 billion. Funds could be taken from advertising budgets, where over R74 million has been allocated, or catering, where a further R77 million is allocated. There’s over R360 million set aside for consultants and a staggering R608 million for transporting and accommodating government officials.

Once allocated, the relief funds must be closely monitored to ensure they are used correctly. For this reason, we again ask MEC Mvoko to ensure that officials from the provincial treasury are seconded to the Scholar Transport Programme in a monitoring and oversight capacity.

The DA also successfully petitioned the Speaker of the Legislature, Helen Sauls-August, last week to have the issue of scholar transport placed on the agenda of the plenary sitting tomorrow as a matter of public importance.

The DA has a plan to rescue the Eastern Cape from maladministration and poor governance, and we will continue to fight for learners across this province to give them a fighting chance for a better future.

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