The right to education for all has been a key public
priority since South Africa’s democratic transition. The legacy of apartheid,
and in particular the fragmented education system which for over 40 years was
based on racial division, left South Africa and its people with a deep-rooted
crisis.
A mere 22% of 24 699 public schools in South Africa have
libraries from which only 8% are functional. One can also look at it from
another perspective – 78% of South Africa’s public schools do not have
libraries. This appalling figure is the number of schools that do not have a
physical space for a library, nor a book collection.
With relation to the Eastern Cape, only 9% of this province’s
5676 public schools have libraries, denying the rest of the learners access to
regular reading opportunities. This figure further indicates that this province
has the fewest libraries in relation to the number of schools. This comes as no
surprise that the Eastern Cape is one of the provinces that perform the poorest
academically compared to public schools in other provinces.
Further statistics show that more than 19 000 primary and
secondary schools, in South Africa, do not have libraries or computer centres.
KwaZulu-Natal and the Eastern Cape have the most shortages with more than 4000
schools in each province without a library, as opposed to Gauteng and the
Western Cape that have fewer than 1000 schools each that do not have libraries
or computer centres.
This really goes to the heart of the South African education
crisis.
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