Textbook delivery on track – Limpopo Department of Education

The department of education in Limpopo says it’s working around the clock to ensure it corrects past mistakes to deliver textbooks in time for the start of the 2018 academic year.

The provincial and national departments have been taken to court over the past few years by civil rights organisations including Basic Education for All (BEFA), section 27 and several schools across the province demanding that text- books get delivered on time.

In the past, the department blamed the non-delivery of books and shortages on change of pub- lishers, financial problems, learner migration and inaccurate infor- mation received from schools.

The provincial department says it has begun dispatching text- books for the 2018 academic year and has set a deadline to ensure that all textbooks are delivered by November 2017 to schools that placed orders.

Pride News visited the department’s warehouse in Seshego, outside Polokwane earlier this week, where the textbooks are stored.

It was work in progress, as officials appeared hard at work loading books into trucks to deliver around the province.

According to the spokesperson of the department Sam Makondo, it is the duty and responsibility of the school principal to place an order so that there are no delays in January 2018, “the books which are getting delivered now are according to orders placed by school principals,” he says.

He adds that Grade 10 has the highest demand of textbooks province wide and that is attributed to the high learner enrolment.

Earlier this year the South African Democratic Teachers Union (SADTU) in Limpopo marched to the office of the Premier and that of MEC Ishmael Kgetjepe demanding that textbooks get delivered at schools that had not yet received learning material.

Makondo says 3 600 schools across Limpopo have placed their orders and the service provider looks well on track to meet their deadline. However, SADTU provincial Secretary Matome Rapha- sha says they do not have assurance until the books are delivered in schools, “even last year the books were at the warehouse, but the service provider was incompe- tent to do the work,” he concludes.

By Jeffrey Mogale