By Seelan Naidoo
In a previous opinion piece (IOL, How the Western Cape Education Department secretively exempted over 400 schools from contract teacher post cuts, 21/01/2025) my focus was on the surprising discovery that 437 schools had surreptitiously escaped the chopping block.
A discovery that evoked a huge public reaction, drew stern rebukes of the WCED from opposition parties in the Western Cape and doubletakes by the major teacher unions. Not least because it showed that over 100 of the wealthiest quintile 5 schools had somehow also escaped the cuts altogether.
The disturbing implication, about which there is no doubt, is that the WCED and its MEC David Maynier withheld material information from the legislature and from the affected publics. My article drew an obfuscatory response from Maynier (IOL, 21/01/2025) that did not answer these serious charges and resorted instead to insulting me personally to deflect attention.
In this article, I focus on the 1,031 schools that suffered the cutting of the 2,407 contract teacher posts, ostensibly because of “budget cuts by national government” according to the WCED. These schools appeared on the chop list that Maynier tabled in September 2024 in the Western Cape provincial legislature after he was pressured to do so by the official opposition.
I again used data-driven analysis. This time, to measure the distribution of the cuts to the affected schools, learners, and educators. My findings show in hard statistical terms that this specific administrative action by the WCED fails the crucial tests of equitability and redress that are required by the Constitution and which also find expression in law and in regulations such as the Personnel Administrative Measures (Department of Basic Education, PAM, Government Gazette 2468) which is premised on redress as a condition of administrative action.
I argue that, in failing these crucial tests, the WCED’s action is rendered illegal.
Three analyses of equitability and redress
Table 1 below shows how the post cuts were distributed by quintile.
Public schools are categorised from quintile 1 (the schools in the poorest areas) to quintile 5 (the schools in wealthier areas). Quintiles 1, 2 and 3 schools are typically no-fee schools, whereas quintile 4 and 5 schools may charge fees which are often used to fund SGB posts.
This table provides a statistical picture in socioeconomic terms that allows us to test the extent to which the cuts were distributed equitably. Where equitable means, at a minimum, that an administrative action must not worsen the relative state of the poor.
Equitability often has to do with the distribution of public goods. However, in this case it is about the distribution of cost cuts. The minimum criterion for equitability remains the same: the equitable distribution of cuts requires that action undertaken by the state must not worsen the relative state of the most vulnerable sections of the publics affected by such action. That is how I read Section 195 (e) and (d) of the Constitution.
Key findings of the analysis of Table 1 are that:
- The poorest quintile 1 schools bear the heaviest percentage cuts of WCED-funded posts (10,2%) and thus bear an unfair loss of public funding. This is inequitable because it worsens the relative state of the poorest citizens.
- The poorest quintile 1 schools also bear the heaviest percentage cuts of total educators (8,8%) and thus bear an unfair deterioration of the educator-to-learner ratio. This is inequitable because it worsens the relative state of the poorest citizens.
Table 2 below shows how the cuts are distributed by the schools’ former (pre-1994) education department. This provides a picture of the cuts in terms of racially-inflected socioeconomic terms – it thus provides a measurement of the cuts in terms of redress.
Redress is understood here to mean the reduction of racial skews due to historical disadvantage. That is how I read Section 195(I) of the Constitution.
Key findings of the analysis of Table 2 are that:
- The former HOR (i.e. apartheid-era House of Representatives) schools bear the heaviest percentage cuts of WCED-funded posts (9,6%). While the former CED (whites-only in the apartheid-era) schools bear the lightest burden of the cuts in relative terms (7,9%). This is anti-redress because it favours a privileged racial group.
- The contrast is starker for the impact on total educators. The CED schools bear a much lower percentage of cuts (4,7%) versus 8,4% cut from former HOR schools. This is anti-redress because it favours a privileged racial group.
Table 3 below is an analysis of all the WCED schools taken together – that is, it analyses the impact of the cuts by the former department across all ordinary public schools whether they were subjected to cuts or not. This provides a high-level test of the extent to which redress is achieved by the cuts or not.
Key findings of the analysis of Table 3 are that:
- Overall, schools that currently serve predominantly black learners (i.e HOR, DET, HOD, and WCE) bear slightly higher cuts of WCED-funded posts than schools that currently serve predominantly white learners. The percentage differences between them may be small, however, the more important point is that they go in the wrong direction from a redress perspective. In short, the cuts demonstrably fail the redress test.
- The differences are much starker when the impact on teaching and learning is considered in terms of the percentage of total educators lost. This measure is more important because it reflects the actual impact on learners and teachers in their classrooms. Here we find that the predominantly white schools suffer only half the impact on schools that predominantly serve black learners. Therefore, in terms of overall impact, the cuts demonstrably worsen racial skews in basic education. In short, the cuts are anti-redress.
Dispensing with Maynier’s fallacious response to this analysis
An argument by Maynier that has been made against the above interpretations of the data needs to be dispensed with. That is the argument that the WCED merely applied a ‘DBE formula’ to determine the number of posts and the number of cuts.
This is a poor argument that does not stand up to scrutiny. Several objections are fatal to it.
Firstly, Maynier repetitively emphasises that the cuts were determined by some mysterious formula which the WCED has also not deigned to share with the public. However, he remains oblivious to the equitability of the cuts and the extent to which they move in the direction of redress. He does not seem to care at all about how the cuts have landed on those affected by them.
Secondly, Maynier’s insistence on the cutting of specifically WCED-funded contract teaching posts is merely a matter of administrative convenience and begs an important question. Why implement this specific cost-cutting action which is so detrimental to teaching and learning? Why cut what is of most importance to basic education? What other cost-cutting measures were considered? By how much has Maynier’s large administration been cut?
Thirdly, Maynier does not seem to understand what equitable means, and perhaps he does not even care. However, the exemption of 437 schools, among which over 111 of the wealthiest, quintile 5 schools were found ensconced, is obviously inequitable irrespective of which ‘formula’ the WCED used.
Conclusion
The above analysis shows in clear evidence-based terms, and from different perspectives, that the WCED’s specific administrative action, of cutting of 2,407 WCED-funded contract teacher posts, is inequitable. Moreover, it is contrary to the redress of racial imbalances in the basic education system in the Western Cape.
Therefore, the WCED’s administrative action is unconstitutional and thus illegal.
The question that remains open is: who will be held liable for the damages done to the affected teachers and learners, and for the fruitless and wasteful expenditure that has been incurred by the WCED when public resources are so scarce?
* Dr Seelan Naidoo is principal associate at Public Ethos Consulting. He holds a master's in Decision-making, Knowledge and Values from Stellenbosch University, and a PhD in Organisation Studies and Cultural Theory from the University of St Gallen. He is an associated researcher of the Centre for Humanities Research at the University of the Western Cape. He writes here in his personal capacity.
** The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of IOL or Independent Media.