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The Democratic Alliance in KwaZulu-Natal calls on the MEC for Education, Mthandeni Dlungwana, to urgently intervene in the school feeding crisis in the province.

We will also write to the Office of the Public Protector to request that the current Schools’ Nutrition Programme tender cycle, in particular that of the Pinetown District, be investigated.

According to reports, more than 50 000 children did not receive a meal on the first day of the new term yesterday. This despite claims yesterday by the provincial Education Department that there were no disruptions to the feeding scheme.

The DA is deeply concerned by the ongoing problems within this programme. These include claims of improper tender processes and corruption during the current tender cycle, new tender awardees failing to attend compulsory briefing sessions, successful companies having links to government officials, some companies being formed just days before the starting and/or closing dates of the tender and others which allegedly failed to receive letters of notification from the DoE.

We have also read through the various affidavits from the recent court case regarding this matter where a number of important procedural issues were raised. While the case was struck off the roll it was on technical points and not on the merits of the case, which means that many questions still require proper answers.

The DA is not here to support either the new tender awardees or the unsuccessful companies. What we are here for is to ensure that proper procedure was followed and that learners receive these meals that are vital to their educational success.

For some children this is the only meal for the day.

The DA will not sit back and watch as funds allocated to feed our school children are stolen by unscrupulous tenderpreneurs.

Issued by DA