South Africa’s richest province wants schools to further increase their capacity

The Gauteng Department of Education (GDE) says that it is negotiating with schools to increase their capacity and take on additional learners. 

As millions of students begin their school year today, 14 January, about 3,000 Grade 8 and Grade 1 students still have not been placed in schools.

GDE spokesperson Steve Mabona visited frustrated parents today who waited in line at various district education offices to urgently finalise their child’s placement. 

Desperate parents of unplaced children who have stood in snaking queues throughout the past week have criticised the Department’s online admissions system. 

Speaking to the SABC outside of the Morningside District Office in Sandton, Mabona said that there is nothing wrong with the system.

“The challenge we have is capacity. We cannot accommodate all parents who have applied.”

He added that to try and address the challenge, they are actively negotiating with schools to increase their capacity and take on additional learners. 

Gauteng Education MEC Matome Chiloane said that the GDE will place learners in schools while the education department builds more schools.

These additional learners will be placed in schools already at full capacity, adding pressure to the system. This is despite the Education MEC stating that it is not an option to add more learners to these schools.

Deputy CEO of the Federation of Governing Bodies of South African Schools (FEDSAS), Riaan van der Bergh, told Newsday: “Schools cannot just increase their capacity. Gauteng schools are already at double the size of the national average school.”

He explained that this is not the first year that this problem has occurred, as Gauteng has grown exponentially, adding about 700,000 leaners to the system over the last 15 years.

“The need in the province is far more than the supply of seats in the areas where learners live, or their parents work,” he said.

The Department has promised that the new schools will be ready by the end of January, and by this time, learners who have been left without a school so far will be accommodated.

MEC warns of a system collapse

On the sidelines of the matric results celebration event on Tuesday, 13 January, Chiloane said that the only solution is to build more schools in the high-pressure areas.

“Because the current schools there are really full. If we put any more learners in them, we are really going to begin to collapse the system,” he said. 

These latest developments come after Mabona told Newzroom Africa in December 2025 that the Gauteng Department of Education is not responsible for building schools to alleviate pressure on institutions. 

“We don’t have a responsibility to build schools. The Department of Infrastructure must build schools,” the spokesperson said.

“But because of the situation we have found ourselves in, we have had to intervene, let’s have partners, and make sure that we enter the space and we build.”

Van der Bergh said that the department’s online system, which has been in place for over 10 years, could have provided the data for corrective action, planning of infrastructure development and coordination with other authorities.

The GDE informed Parliament in May 2025 that the number of new learners entering its public schooling system each year had increased from 90,992 at the start of 2015 to 124,375 in 2025.

The province reports that the most significant portion of new learners comes from foreign countries, with 30,090 arriving from abroad in 2025. This has grown from just over 12,000 in 2015.

Despite this, data from The Outlier revealed that the province has only built 48 public schools since the start of the 2015/16 financial year, which is less than half the number built by the Western Cape (97).

According to the data, the province had 2.33 million learners, but only 2,068 schools to accommodate them, resulting in an average of 1,127 learners per school.

More schools desperately needed

When asked about the rate of urban development relative to the number of schools built, Mabona said that municipalities continue to approve housing projects but not the expansion of schools.

“When we ask the municipalities for approval, we hit a stalemate because the increase in classrooms is above the approved capacity for the school,” Mabona said.

When asked about ways the Department has mitigated issues of learner placement in high-pressure areas, Mabona said that the GDE has deployed satellite schools, which he claims can absorb the surplus of learners.

As for building new brick-and-mortar schools, the spokesperson said that several contracts are delayed due to the interference of business forums, such as construction mafias, or contractors providing “shoddy work”.

However, he stated that the Department is currently working on a project to build several schools in high-pressure areas, which is expected to be completed in March 2026.

Van der Bergh said that 40% of schools in Gauteng are independent schools, a staggering increase in the last ten years.

Had the independent sector not developed so fast in the province, the situation would have been exponentially worse, according to the Fedsas Deputy CEO.

“I feel for parents and learners who did not start day one of what should be a very exciting and positive experience in changing their futures for the best,” he said.

“If not placed permanently soon, they will remain feeling on the back foot with their education for the foreseeable future.”