Nearly a quarter of a million pupils in Buffalo City and Nelson Mandela Bay walk to school each day, with a new Stats SA report shedding light on the scale of the daily journeys many children undertake simply to access education.
The figures reveal that 243,339 pupils in the two metros walk to and from school, with thousands spending between 30 minutes and an hour on foot each way.
For some pupils in rural Eastern Cape communities, the journey is even longer, involving river crossings, dark winter mornings and worn-out shoes.
Behind the statistics are pupils such as a 17-year-old pupil from Mphintsho village in Ncera, who walks more than an hour each way to attend Tsholomnqa High School.
When the Dispatch caught up with him shortly after 4pm on Monday as he walked home from school, he was wearing running shoes.
“My school shoes got worn out,” he said.
The teenager said a pair of school shoes lasted him only about two months and that his grandmother, with whom he lives, could not afford to replace them regularly.
He wakes at 5am every day, leaves home at 6am and arrives at school at about 7.30am.
After school, he still has household responsibilities.
“After school, I still have to do house chores like fetching water and cooking before I can do my school work.”
The data comes as the province continues to grapple with a scholar transport crisis that has left thousands of qualifying pupils without assistance despite a Makhanda High Court ruling ordering authorities to provide transport to eligible pupils.
According to statistician-general Risenga Maluleke in compiling its recent State of the Metros report it was found that 99,113 pupils in Buffalo City Metro walk to school.
Of those, 59,457 walk for about 15 minutes, 35,910 walk between 15 and 30 minutes, and 12,397 walk between 30 minutes and an hour, while 349 walk for about an hour and 30 minutes.
In Nelson Mandela Bay, 144,226 pupils walk to school.
The largest group, 81,361 pupils, walk between 15 and 30 minutes, while 58,985 walk about 15 minutes and 3,879 walk between 30 minutes and an hour.
Other pupils travelling the route described similar hardships getting to and from school.
A 14-year-old grade 8 girl from Tsaba village said she woke at 5.30am each day and left home at 6am to begin the journey to school.
“Now that it is winter, we leave our homes in the dark,” she said.
She said many pupils missed school when it rained.
A grade 12 pupil walking the same route said pupils had one simple request.
“We wish the MEC and the premier could help end this suffering,” she said.
The pupil said that when the weather deteriorated, the normal route became dangerous and pupils were forced to take an alternative path that could take more than two hours to complete.
The Dispatch encountered the pupils while they were crossing a river on their journey home.
Parent Siphenathi Phethani, who has two children attending Tsholomnqa High School, said severe weather often prevented pupils from reaching school.
“When the river is overflowing, they can’t go to school,” she said.
She said parents encouraged children to walk in groups to reduce the risk of crime and robbery.
In 2023, a media team accompanying pupils from nearby Xesi to Zweliyandila High in Tsholomnqa were themselves robbed at gunpoint.
Phethani said parents who could afford it paid for private transport, but most families had no alternative.
“Most of the pupils walk,” she said.
Similar concerns were raised in Mdantsane, where pupils from Unit P walk long distances.
A grade 7 pupil at Sakhile Primary School said children feared for their safety while walking.
“We always walk in big groups, though we know it doesn’t help sometimes, because we could easily get hurt by big men,” she said.
“We sometimes try to hitchhike, even if we get a ride and squash ourselves in a bakkie.”
The pupil said many children arrived at school exhausted.
“Some of us come from disadvantaged backgrounds, so we go to school on empty stomachs, hoping we will get a school nutritional meal there.
“Some of us arrive home tired from the walk.”
A grade 6 pupil from Nowonga Primary School said many children felt unfairly excluded from scholar transport.
“I believe we all deserve to be transported because I feel we are being deprived of education,” he said.
“There are some children who no longer attend school because of the lack of transport.”
Provincial transport department spokesperson Unathi Binqose said the department was currently transporting 115,379 of about 163,000 pupils identified as requiring scholar transport across the province.
In Buffalo City, 12,455 of 16,255 qualifying pupils were receiving transport, while 6,716 of 8,227 qualifying pupils were being transported in Nelson Mandela Bay.
Binqose said eligibility was determined by the education department in line with the Provincial Learner Transport Policy.
“The qualifying criteria are determined by the department of education, in alignment with the Provincial Learner Transport Policy.
“But the key to that is it doesn’t cater for a school of choice.
“If you leave school A in your village and prefer school C elsewhere, that isn’t catered for,” he said.
Binqose said inadequate funding remained a major obstacle.
“There are ongoing engagements with the provincial treasury and the national department of transport.”
Children’s rights activist Petros Majola of the Khula Community Development Project said the figures highlighted the challenges many pupils continued to face.
“The fact that they walk these long distances is another sign of a collapsed system that forgot about its people.
“When I see this, I am made to believe that the future of an African child will soon perish as the government has thrown it in the cold,” he said.
The South African Human Rights Commission said scholar transport was not merely a transport issue but an education rights issue.
Provincial manager Dr Eileen Carter said lengthy journeys could affect attendance, punctuality, pupil safety, concentration and participation in school activities, and should prompt closer scrutiny of whether pupils were able to access education in a manner consistent with their constitutional rights.
DA transport spokesperson Horatio Hendricks said budget constraints continued to leave tens of thousands of qualifying pupils without assistance.
He said replies to parliamentary questions showed that 115,379 pupils were transported during the 2024/2025 financial year at a cost of about R1.2bn, while 43,982 qualifying pupils received no transport because of budget constraints.
According to Hendricks, the number of qualifying pupils had since risen to about 163,000, requiring an estimated R1.592bn to provide scholar transport across the province.
“Despite this clear and urgent need, the allocation for scholar transport in the 2026/2027 financial year stands at just R844m,” he said.
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