Closure of South Africa’s schools during the seven-week coronavirus pandemic lockdown is threatening to cripple the country’s private educational institutions, APA learnt on Sunday.
According to the National Alliance of Independent School Association (NAISA), the socio-economic and health lockdown has negatively affected the delicate finances of the country’s independent schools.
The situation has left many parents, who are not working or have temporarily stopped their businesses, struggling to keep up with school fees due to lack of economic activities.
NAISA secretary-general Ebrahim Ansur said the country’s economic situation during the lockdown was dire, as 90 percent of income of its independent schools came from school fees.
“There are some independent schools which are a little more fortunate in that, the parents paid fees upfront at the beginning of the year. But a large number of independent schools that we have around the country, the parents pay either on a monthly basis or on a termly basis,” Ansur said.
He said due to the lockdown and the restrictions of economic activity, “payment of school fees has been very, very slow indeed and many independent schools are struggling to survive.”
AdvTech, a Johannesburg Stock Exchange-listed private education group, has reported a 20-percent drop in school fee collections for April.
NM/jn/APA