- David Livingstone Senior Secondary School is finally being handed over 12 years after construction began, and more than seven years after its original completion date.
- The project’s cost ballooned from R71.5 million to a reported R170 million, yet two essential vocational facilities were still not delivered.
- The DA will refer the project to SCOPA for a full investigation into the delays, cost escalation, payment failures, and lack of consequence management.
The learners and staff of David Livingstone Senior Secondary School deserve to celebrate finally receiving a modern school. The additional classrooms, admin block, ablution facilities and sports facilities are a welcome addition, and will definitely improve the conditions of learners at the school.
However, the Eastern Cape government does not deserve applause for taking 12 years to deliver it.
The project began in 2014 and was supposed to be handed over in June 2019. Instead, the school is only being officially handed over tomorrow, more than seven years after the original deadline.
Those delays have had real consequences for learners.
Seven matric classes have come and gone since the school should have been completed. The class of 2019 should have benefited from the new facilities during its final year, while every matric class from 2020 to 2025 completed school without ever benefiting from the finished project. The class of 2026 has spent almost its entire high-school career waiting.
These learners cannot be invited back to reclaim the opportunities they were denied.
The financial failure is equally staggering. The school had an original budget of R71.5 million. Its reported final cost has now reached R170 million, almost R100 million more than originally budgeted and well over double the initial cost.
Despite the extraordinary delays and escalating costs, the project has also failed to deliver the two vocational spaces the school needs. After 12 years and R170 million, learners should not still be waiting for essential facilities.
The Department previously admitted that construction had been suspended due to the main contractor not being paid. It also confirmed that no disciplinary action or consequence management had been instituted in relation to the delays.
This is not an example of efficient infrastructure delivery. It is evidence of a provincial government that repeatedly fails to deliver projects on time, control expenditure, pay contractors, or hold anyone accountable when projects collapse.
The DA will formally refer the David Livingstone project to the Eastern Cape Legislature’s Standing Committee on Public Accounts and request a full investigation into the delays, cost escalation, payment failures, and absence of consequence management.
The Provincial Departments of Education and Public Works and Infrastructure, the implementing agent, the contractor, and the professional service providers must be called before the committee to explain how a R71.5 million project became a R170 million project, why it took 12 years to complete, and why the vocational facilities identified as necessary for the school were not delivered.
The school community deserves to celebrate finally receiving its new facilities. The Premier, however, deserves no victory lap. This handover must mark the beginning of accountability, not the end of scrutiny.