Water crisis averted at 19 schools after education department agrees to pay bills

16 January 2017 - 13:25 By Hayley Grammer
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An engineering company has called off action to remove infrastructure that would have left 19 schools without water in the Eastern Cape.

Jo-Minproc Engineering manager Eric Sefa said the company was awarded a four-month water and sanitation tender for the schools in Queenstown and Sterkspruit in 2014 as part of an accelerated school infrastructure delivery initiative.

Sefa claimed that he is owed R1.9-million by the Department of Basic Education for work done at the schools.

Sefa said last week that lawyers had been instructed to seek an interdict preventing the water supply from being reconnected until payment was made.

But‚ on Monday‚ he said that the department had come forward in an effort to resolve the issue.

“We were going to stop the water supply and remove vital infrastructure until the department sorted out the problem‚ but we have since called off the action‚” said Sefa.

Sefa said that that‚ due to the lack of payment‚ his company has had to retrench staff and faces a fine from the South African Revenue Service as a result of unpaid taxes.

Education department spokesman Elijah Mhlanga had previously said that the payments were up to date.

“A batch of invoices from Jo-Minproc was paid... in December 2015‚ followed by another two in 2016.

“Payments were up to date up until 7 December‚ when the latest invoice was received just before the break‚ and this — along with a series of variation orders — is being processed‚” Mhlanga said last week.

Sefa said the payments that Mhlanga referred to were not for the completed work on the 19 schools.

In 2016‚ Equal Education‚ an NGO‚ visited 60 schools in the Eastern Cape to see whether government had complied with regulations relating to the Minimum Uniform Norms and Standards for School Infrastructure.

“We visited schools with appalling infrastructure. Some were completely made of inappropriate materials or had no access to water or electricity. In total‚ 17 of the 60 schools we visited constitute an outright violation of the three-year deadline. In other instances‚ government has done the bare minimum to comply with the law‚ and has shown contempt for the spirit of the law‚'' said a report by Equal Education.

Read Equal Education's findings here.

- TMG Digital/The Times

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