With the 2024 school year set to begin on Wednesday, the Eastern Cape Department of Transport has learnt from the failures of the Scholar Transport Programme and has applied those lessons to its new automated scholar transport technology.
The new system, known as the Learner Transport Management System, is set to improve the day-to-day running of the scholar transport system.
The system will help eliminate possible human manipulation and human errors within the service.
The Scholar Transport Programme has been plagued by payment issues. Last year, that often meant thousands of learners stranded with no means of getting to school.
This year, however, the department is confident that the problems with scholar transport will be a thing of the past.
EC Transport spokesperson Unathi Binqose says the department believes that this new system will be a catalyst for a more efficient scholar transport service.
“This new technology will help in managing and monitoring the end-to-end process of the Scholar Transport Programme to increase capacity to deliver accurate information, provide a coherent performance monitoring system and eliminate over and underpayments,” Binqose said.
Last week, Scrolla.Africa reported that scholar transport operators in the province were threatening not to transport learners as they had not been paid since November.
Speaking about outstanding payments, Binqose said bulk messages were sent to contractors on 9 January to submit invoices to facilitate payments.
“The appetite to pay is there and the means to do so is also there,” Binqose said.
He added that outstanding invoices stood at over R10 million and that invoices were still trickling in.
“We expect more when schools open because claims have to be accompanied by proof of delivery which is done by school principals, so some are still waiting for schools to reopen. We are confident that when schools reopen, pupils will be ferried to school,” he said.
Pictured above: Eastern Cape pupils crossing a river to get to school.
Image source: DA EC Communications
