By Levy Masiteng
Equal Education (EE) and the Equal Education Law Centre (EELC) have demanded that Basic Education Minister Siviwe Gwarube explain why school capacity regulations remain unpublished 10 days after a court-ordered deadline.
In a joint statement on Monday, the organisations called for the immediate publication of the final Minimum Uniform Norms and Standards for School Capacity, saying that continued delays were leaving learners in overcrowded classrooms without adequate space and resources.
The deadline expired on 9 October, three years after the Gauteng High Court ordered the Minister of Basic Education to develop and publish the regulations in a case involving the South African Teachers’ Union (SAOU).
“This court order was not a suggestion; it was a directive that must be complied with. Learners cannot continue to wait while they are forced to learn in overcrowded classrooms without the space and resources they need,” the organisations said.
The Department of Basic Education (DBE) did not respond to requests for comment from Inside Education.
The regulations are intended to establish clear rules governing how many learners schools can accommodate, how much space should be allocated to each learner and teacher, and when additional classrooms, teachers or other resources are required.
EE and the EELC said the absence of binding capacity regulations continued to undermine efforts to address overcrowding and ensure that learners had access to safe and adequate learning environments.
They warned that overcrowding limited individual attention from teachers, contributed to mobile classrooms becoming permanent structures and exacerbated the ongoing school admissions crisis.
The DBE published the first draft of the proposed regulations for public comment on 7 August 2025.
Following its release, EE and the EELC held workshops with learners and school communities to gather input on the proposals. They also hosted a public meeting attended by learners, community members and DBE representatives.
The organisations submitted consolidated comments to the department in December 2025, identifying several shortcomings in the draft.
These included the absence of a definition of overcrowding, clear implementation deadlines and clarity on the responsibilities of different stakeholders.
They also raised concerns about inconsistencies between the proposed formula for calculating classroom capacity and the teacher-to-learner ratios contained in the draft regulations.
EE, with support from the EELC, subsequently developed alternative proposals, known as shadow capacity norms, to account for the conditions faced by schools that were already overcrowded and under-resourced.
The organisations said they had sought an opportunity to present these proposals to the DBE but had not received the feedback they expected.
“We sought an opportunity to present these proposals to the DBE. However, despite the expectation that the DBE would respond, we have yet to receive the promised feedback,” they said.
EE and the EELC are now demanding the “immediate release” of the final regulations, a public explanation from Gwarube for missing the court-ordered deadline and binding implementation timelines supported by clear accountability mechanisms.
They also want the regulations to include a definition of overcrowding that prioritises schools most severely affected by the problem.
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