Times Of Swaziland: SCHOOL CRISIS: SNAT GIVES GOVT 7-DAY ULTIMATUM

SCHOOL CRISIS: SNAT GIVES GOVT 7-DAY ULTIMATUM
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Siboniso Nkambule on 16/09/2024 08:50:00


MBABANE – SNAT has given the Ministry of Education and Training until the end
of this week to settle outstanding payments or head teachers will lock up
schools.
In its warning to the ministry, the Swaziland National Association of Teachers
(SNAT) emphasised the urgency of clearing outstanding payments to schools this
week. According to SNAT Secretary General (SG) Lot Vilakati, head teachers will
be left with no choice but to surrender school keys to the ministry if payments
are not made in full. Vilakati said without the necessary funds, head teachers
cannot operate schools, as the financial strain threatens the learning
institutions’ daily function. This comes after a week since schools have been
opened for the third term. Before schools opened last week, SNAT and head
teachers voiced concerns about schools’ readiness to resume classes, citing a
range of pressing issues.
Payment
They said school bank accounts were reportedly nearly empty due to
government’s failure to fulfil its payment obligations, leaving many schools
without essential resources like food, electricity and water. Furthermore, they
also stated that government had not permanently hired the 4 000 qualified
teachers needed to fill 4 000 vacant posts left by retired, deceased,
transferred, dismissed and resigned staff, exacerbating the challenges faced by
schools. According to Vilakati, they have been promised that all payments
directed to schools will be finalised this week. He said if the week ends
without payments being made, this will call for head teachers  to surrender
school keys to the ministry to see what to do with the schools, more especially
high schools, as they are the most affected.
He explained that they have discussed the delay in payments of the free primary
education (FPE) and orphaned and vulnerable children’s (OVC) grants for a long
time. Vilakati stated that it is their belief as SNAT, that education issues
should be handled by the Ministry of Education and Training to avoid constant
delays. “All education-related matters should go back to the ministry.
Scholarships should move from the Ministry of Labour and Social Security back to
Education, including the payment of OVCs. The ministries will keep blaming one
another while the schools suffer. The inter-ministerial bureaucracy results in
the lack of service delivery, which affects emaSwati, who then do not get the
desired education in schools,” Vilakati said. He went on to allege that the
challenges faced by schools do not affect the senior officials’ children, as
they enrol their children in private schools.
Education
Vilakati said the delay in payments affects the ordinary people and in that way,
kills the country’s education. “The delaying tactics and putting blame on
certain departments does not help anyone. This is the same issue regarding
offering government posts. Each and every ministry should manage its post and
this will decrease the unnecessary delays experienced when posts need to be
filled,” he said. Furthermore, Vilakati mentioned that they have received
feedback from some head teachers, who said they started receiving FPE grants,
but the majority have not received them yet. On the same note, the Swaziland
Association of School Administrators (SASA) Secretary, Gcina Thusi confirmed
that some schools started receiving the FPE grant, as of Friday last week. Thusi
said he could not ascertain how many schools have been paid at the moment. He
said they were assured that this process would be concluded by this
week.According to Thusi, they will wait until the end of the week to see if the
promises are kept.