KZN education department's slow progress on teacher vetting raises safety concerns

The Department of Basic Education (DBE) has raised concern over KwaZulu-Natal’s slow progress in vetting teachers against the National Register for Sex Offenders (NRSO), warning that the province’s financial and logistical constraints threaten efforts to ensure the safety of learners.

Department spokesperson Lukhanyo Mvanqa said in a recent interview on radio station, SAFM, that Minister Siviwe Gwarube has prioritised school safety and child protection in schools as among her top five focus areas.

“The Minister’s top five priorities, one of those is school safety, to ensure that children exist in schools that are safe and conducive for learning,” he said.

“That starts with ensuring that the people that we allow into our premises are properly vetted, so that we can ensure that children remain safe.”

The department has embarked on a teacher vetting process in South Africa to vet all 485,000 teachers against both the NRSO and the Child Protection Register to ensure that no convicted offenders are employed in schools. However, as of March this year, only about 78,500 of the country’s 405,000 serving teachers had undergone vetting.

Mvanqa said KwaZulu-Natal remains the department’s “serious concern” due to its slow pace in the vetting process.

“KwaZulu-Natal is a serious concern as a province in terms of its vetting,” he said. “Gauteng is moving at a good pace, but we’re concerned about KwaZulu-Natal,  not only the fact that they’re lagging behind, but that the recovery plan is currently not believable, and that they can catch up to where we need them to be by the end of this year.”

He attributed much of the delay to KZN education department's financial difficulties. While there are financial constraints in education departments across the country, KZN is facing significant challenges.

“They employ just about over a quarter of all the teachers that we have in the country,” he said.

He added that with about 120,000 teachers and the vetting cost of R100 per teacher, KZN would need about R12 million that they must find within their budget for them to pay for this vetting. But the provincial department is already facing financial difficulties with the latest issue being lack of funding for special schools.

Mvanqa said Minister Gwarube has been engaging Minister of Justice and Constitutional Development Mmamoloko Kubayi to explore ways of accelerating the vetting and reducing financial barriers.

“If possible, we can exempt a province like KwaZulu-Natal that simply doesn’t have the finances for them to do the vetting from the charges that are attended to the vetting process,” he said.

The vetting drive which involves the departments of Basic Education, Justice, and Police, is a “massive logistical undertaking,” according to Mvanqa.

To improve oversight, Gwarube has made the issue a standing item on the Council of Education Ministers’ agenda, requiring each province to report and account for its progress.

While the process continues, the department has also begun vetting 9,900 student teachers funded under the Funza Lushaka Bursary Scheme, who have access to schools during training. “This is to ensure that we don’t allow registered and convicted sex offenders to go and teach in our schools or to work within our schools,” said Mvanqa.

He also addressed concerns raised about the South African Council for Educators (SACE), which reported 606 complaints in the 2024–2025 financial year but finalised only 134 hearings, leading to 36 permanent dismissals.

“SACE was not initially meant to handle investigations. It is a registration body, and the capacity for them to undertake investigations is not… it’s a capacity that needs to be built up,” he said.

He said the department has asked SACE to partner with bodies such as the Public Protector to strengthen investigative capacity. “We are building that capacity internally for SACE for them to roll out those investigations,” Mvanqa said.

He said the department, under Minister Gwarube, remains committed to completing the vetting process. “We must ensure that schools remain safe for children, and we don’t subject them to sexual abuse by not properly vetting people that work there,” he said.

KZN Education department's Muzi Mahlambi said while KZN was among the three provinces mentioned where the percentage (of vetting) is low there was progress in terms of meeting the intentions of the programme. 

He added that the vetting process had nothing to do with the fiscal position of the department as this is an interdepartmental programme that includes police, the justice department and others.

* This story was updated with the KZN Education department's comment.

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