ECD centres in the North West have not received their stipends, and there is doubt they will be paid
Early Childhood Development (ECD) practitioners in the North West have been left high and dry, facing a bleak Christmas, despite promises that their stipends and subsidy payments will be paid.
About 160 ECD centres, mostly in the Ngaka Modiri Molema District, have not received their stipends for 2025. They depend on these stipends to stay afloat, including paying staff, with many facing collapse.
ECD centres under strain as stipends delayed
Last week, Education MEC Viola Motsumi said she would actively intervene in the crisis and promised payment by the end of this week.
A directive issued to ECD centres, dated 22 December, stated that quarterly subsidy payments, including the approved adjustment from R17 to R24 per child, were processed during the past week.
Lengane Bogatsu, the department’s superintendent general, said in the directive: “An additional payment is scheduled to reflect in programme bank accounts on Monday, 22 December 2025… Principals and Centre Managers are hereby directed to ensure that Grade R practitioners are paid an amount of R15 000 from the subsidy funds received by 23 December 2025.”
He acknowledged the delay, saying it was due to essential verification processes and related administrative factors at the start of the financial year.
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Bogatsu said the centre management has been instructed to proceed with these payments immediately, providing full assurance that funds utilised from current subsidies will be reimbursed once the standard transfer process for practitioner payments was finalised.
He said the department sought to resolve the non-payment of practitioners urgently to alleviate financial strain on caregivers and their families during the festive season.
‘Empty promise’
But Annah Fourie, chairperson of the South African Association for Early Childhood Development, said none of the ECD centres, including hers, had received any payment.
“All we have is an empty promise…it is a very depressing situation. I do not even have anything to pay the practitioners. We have worked for the entire year, without getting a cent and we are literally on our knees,” she said.
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Department’s financial system closed
A senior education department official cast doubt on the promise that the ECD centres will be paid, saying there are no funds and, if the government found money, the financial system is closed for the festive season.
According to an internal circular, dated 17 November 2025, the final date for payment of creditors was 19 December and the first payments for 2026 was 6 January.
“The government system is closed for now. How are they going to pay? The department is not being honest with the ECD centres. The truth is the department collapsed administration of ECD in the province. The province has failed to administer the ECD budget by not giving the ECD centres their allocations,” the official said.
Provincial department of education spokesperson Vuyo Mantshule had not commented at the time of publishing.
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