Upgraded toilets at Deda Primary School in Ndwedwe
Pupils and teachers at a Ndwedwe school now have access to safe ablution
facilities.
The toilets at Deda Primary School were upgraded with the help of private companies.
It is now one of the few schools in the Ozwathini area with flushing toilets.
"I heard of a horrific story of a child who drowned here in a pit toilet,” said Basic Education Minister Siviwe Gwarube at the handover on Monday.
“While they were able to be saved, again, it speaks to the issue of safety of the use of pit toilets but also the dignity of these children. As we stand here, it is the eve of World Toilet Day, and we are saying that South Africa is experiencing a crisis. There are still thousands of schools that are using pit toilets that are not safe for our learners but is also not dignified for our learners to use these toilets and educators at the school."
She says the department is working hard to reduce the backlog of pit toilets at 4,000 schools nationwide.
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"And we are 92% of the way through in terms of clearing those unsafe pit toilets; however, in the next couple of weeks, we will be making another announcement about a monitoring tool that we want to use.
“It is not enough to simply say you have cleared the backlog. Things like infrastructure is something that we need to have a continuous look on, we have to have live data that tells you where they are popping up [and] where are pit toilets."
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