The principal of an impoverished no-fee school in the Eastern Cape is alleged to have blown more than R1m meant for school meals, learning materials and maintenance on booze, fancy restaurants, fuel and other luxuries.
Mihlali Makhalima has a reputation for boosting the matric pass rate at Ulwazi High School in Mdantsane, East London. But an investigation by the provincial department of education accuses him of raiding the school’s coffers.
Bank statements seen by the Sunday Times reveal that in the 16 months to April this year, almost R250,000 was spent in such upmarket eateries as Grazia Fine Food & Wine and La Grato in East London.
A further R450,000 in cash was withdrawn from ATMs, while R226,000 was withdrawn from tills at grocery stores and in other cash-back transactions. The cash withdrawals, averaging more than R42,000 a month, have no corresponding expenditure records or justification.
Hundreds of other payments are listed on the bank statements, including to Hungry Lion, Shoprite, Pep Stores, KFC, Boxer, Superspar, the Ekoneni Lounge bar, Devotions Liquor, car washes, hardware stores and butcheries. All were made with a debit card linked to the school account, into which state grants are paid.
On Friday, two days after the Sunday Times sent questions to the provincial department of education, Makhalima was suspended.
The use of bank cards by public schools is prohibited by the South African Schools Act. The Eastern Cape education department requires all school payments to be made by electronic transfer and to be properly documented.
The investigation by the department showed the school had incurred debts of R375,462 related to the national school nutrition programme (NSNP). The report found among other things that the school lacks formal policies on procurement, finance and expenditure.
Meanwhile, pupils say they are not receiving some of the food listed on the school menu.
The official meal plan, which the Sunday Times has seen, lists two meals a day — flavoured maize meal or porridge for breakfast and a cooked lunch — plus fruit.
“We eat at 10.30am and we don’t get cereal. We only eat once a day, there is nothing else that we eat, we don’t eat twice a day,” one of the 1,200 pupils at the school told the Sunday Times.
“Most of the time it’s just plain samp with chicken liver or sometimes samp mixed with beans and meat. We also get rice and chicken or meat, but not chicken stew, and the rice usually has cabbage and carrots.
We get an apple only once in a while, not always. Sometimes a month passes without eating a fruit
— Ulwazi school pupil
“We hardly ever get fruit. We get an apple only once in a while, not always. Sometimes a month passes without eating a fruit. There are no bananas, oranges, or anything like that. Sometimes we eat phuthu with amasi, and even then, there is no fruit with it. There is no fish and pasta at school.”
Mismanagement of school feeding schemes is not unique to Ulwazi. In April, the Sunday Times reported how pupils in Soweto were being fed apples the size of golf balls, bananas the size of a middle finger and rice that does not go soft when cooked. And in July, calls were made for the suspension of the NSNP in KwaZulu-Natal following claims that the tender had been rigged to benefit politically-connected people.
Some teachers and members of Ulwazi’s governing body (SGB) are believed to have received cash, food and fuel from the transactions listed in the bank statements.
Contacted for comment, Makhalima said that when the disciplinary committee holds hearings involving pupils, the school buys the panel members lunch from KFC and Hungry Lion.
“Those meetings are from 10am until 6pm when there are a number of cases. The governing body, teachers and management represented in the committee get their lunch. It is the policy that if they stay more than four hours, they must be fed. So, you find many KFC [transactions] on Tuesdays because the disciplinary committee takes place then,” said Makhalima.
Payments to fast food outlets are listed almost weekly on the bank statements. But several principals at other schools said it was highly unlikely that disciplinary hearings would be held every week.
“It is supposed to be once in a while. If a school holds disciplinary hearings every week, there is a major crisis that requires intervention,” said one principal. “Such a school should be turned into a juvenile [detention centre] because what the principal is presenting there cannot happen.”
Makhalima said some entries in the bank statements that reflected liquor story transactions could be misleading because the same retailer also sold food.
“The liquor store is a butchery and the receipt was there to show that it was meat,” he said.
Asked if he still had the bank card, Makhalima said: “No, we no longer use cards, they were demolished. They were returned a long time ago, I can’t remember, this year.”
He said the card was held by “the relevant people of finance, it is even there in the report… The schooling system has got the finance committee with three signatories, the treasurer, the clerk and a parent. The principal is an accounting officer; he is away from that.”
The education department report records unauthorised payments, listed as “tokens of appreciation”, to members of the governing body.
“This contravenes the Schools Act and good governance practices,” it says.
“Transactions were traced to liquor outlets and bars, clearly indicating use of the school bank card... This is a gross violation of ethical and legal financial conduct as outlined in the Public Finance Management Act.”
The report says a total of nearly R8,000 was spent at liquor outlets.
There is also evidence of a transaction at China Mall in East London. Makhalima declined to comment on this.
Eastern Cape education spokesperson Mali Mtima said Makhalima had been suspended on Friday morning. “Among the things forming part of the investigations are the card and the transactions.”
A text circulated within the department states that Makhalima has been invited to state his case tomorrow.
A man Makhalima identified as the chair of the governing body, who gave his name as Mr Stompi, told the Sunday Times he received meals when on duty at the school.
“Even this Tuesday I had KFC at school. The South African Schools Act is clear that SGB members can be remunerated and also can be provided food if they have meetings at the school. Yes, it’s transport and there is food. That’s what they are remunerated for.”
However, the act says “no member of a governing body may be remunerated in any way for the performance of his or her duties or for the attendance of meetings and school activities”.
Stompi said he was not aware of the investigation or Makhalima’s suspension. He confirmed the department’s risk management division had requested bank statements and other documents.
Referring to Makhalima’s suspension, Stompi said 232 pupils were taking part in a programme to prepare for the matric exams.
“The principal is the one who is monitoring the camp and the studies that they are doing. He is the one who makes sure that they are ready for the exams. If you suspend him now, what is your interest as a department?
“That means it’s a witch hunt. There’s a witch hunt and it’s not going to succeed because we are a praying nation,” Stompi said. “Our prayers will be against anyone who is against the prosperity of our children.”
DA spokesperson for education in the Eastern Cape, Horatio Hendricks, said the situation at Ulwazi exposed broader failures in oversight and accountability within the provincial department.
“The Eastern Cape’s children deserve better. These are gross violations of the Public Finance Management Act and Treasury regulations. We will be tabling a motion in the legislature next week calling for an urgent, independent forensic audit of school finances and the nutrition programme.
“The NSNP has been impacted because the school is running the program in debt. Service providers are owed huge amounts even thousands.”
Hendricks said the DA had referred the matter to education MEC Fundile Gade and head of department Sharon Maasdorp, resulting in the suspension of some principals under investigation for similar misconduct.
Hendricks added: “The DA is deeply concerned about emerging evidence of deep-seated corruption that appears to have taken root in our schools. The effects are devastating. While these lavish expenses are paid on the school account, the books show that the school is nearly half a million in debt.
“The finances also show repeated purchases from liquor outlets and duplicated contractor payments, clearly indicating that the school lacks the required financial policies. Criminal referrals and consequence management must be executed by the department where the forensic audit uncovers wrongdoing, plus immediate steps to recover misappropriated funds.”
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