By Vicky Abraham, Ntokozo Abraham and Adam Oxford
The future of matriculants at Filadelfia Secondary LSEN School in Soshanguve may hang in the balance after the City of Tshwane cut the school’s water and electricity due to an outstanding municipal debt of R7.1m.
There is now uncertainty over whether the matrics will be able to write their first computer applications technology (CAT) exam.
The school caters for the blind, deaf, visually impaired, and those with physical disabilities. Without power, deaf pupils may be unable to begin their exams, as they rely on laptops to record video responses to questions. Blind pupils also face disruption, as Braille formatting and proofreading require power and an internet connection.
The disconnection has plunged the pupils into a crisis at a critical stage of their education.
The Gauteng department of education’s spokesperson Steve Mabona confirmed the school’s electricity had been cut last week. He said it was being attended to and would be resolved urgently. “As a contingency, the school has access to gas for cooking and solar power for energy. Accordingly, examinations will not be impacted,” Mabona said.
The city’s legal standpoint is that electricity supply bylaws permit disconnection due to nonpayment, while water bylaws allow for restriction of supply. City spokesperson Lindela Mashigo confirmed the school owed R7.1m. He said the city would check its records to see if the school had paid R1m towards the debt. “The city was sensitive to the needs of the school and urged its management to bring the accounts up to date to allow reconnection.
“The city understands and sincerely empathises with the difficult circumstances surrounding the disconnection of water and electricity ... particularly during a critical period when learners are writing their final examinations,” he said.
Gauteng spokesperson for the South African Democratic Teachers Union (Sadtu), Nomusa Cembi, said: “This is so insensitive; if they have ubuntu, why not wait until the learners finish exams?
“It forces the school to close down, and therefore the constitutional right of every learner to education is violated. This is happening just days before final-year exams begin, when learners are already tense.”
Cembi said the timing of the cuts showed Tshwane had no concern for the well-being of the children and their education, and he called on the department of education to intervene.
Mashigo said: “The school was duly notified and engaged by the city’s credit control team,” he said. “On August 12 2025, the principal committed to settling the outstanding accounts within three months — an arrangement that, regrettably, was not honoured. Since then, no payments have been made on the hostel and water accounts, and only one partial payment — the school’s monthly consumption — was received on the main electricity account.”
The Sunday Times recently reported that many special schools for the blind and deaf were receiving large, inconsistent utility bills and were often forced to divert money meant for special learning equipment to pay them.
The investigation showed that many of the schools had huge debts.
* Vicky Abraham is an investigative journalist; Ntokozo Abraham an economic and data journalist of Diary Series of Deaf People (www.thedeafdiary.com); and Adam Oxford a data journalist and founder of Area of Effect (areaofeffect.tv). This investigation is produced by the Southern Africa Accountability Journalism Project (SA | AJP), an initiative of the Nxumalo Foundation with the financial assistance of the European Union. It can under no circumstances be regarded as reflecting the position of the EU
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