Colourful paintings of an elephant, a giraffe, penguins, a zebra and a rainbow greet Angel Siyavuya Swartbooi every morning. They adorn the walls of Isiphiwo public primary school in Khayelitsha, where the 10-year-old – Siya, for short – is a pupil.
Maths is his favourite subject – “I love counting,” he says – but his real passion is football. “I’m a defender. I like it because it keeps me fit and I love running around. When I finish school, I want to play for Barcelona.”
It is a common pipe dream in a township where people have no better than a 50:50 chance of finding work. The odds are stacked against Siya compared with children attending schools in the middle-class suburbs of nearby Cape Town. South Africa’s ailing education system has failed to close the gap between rich and poor.
Isiphiwo primary school opened in 1995, a year after the country’s post-apartheid democracy was born. Siya leaves home at 6.30am, has a long walk to school and takes his place in classes of at least 40 pupils. He speaks Xhosa and has not yet learned English, the dominant language of business and politics in South Africa.
His mother Nonzuzo, 28, says: “He’s doing fine. I think it dropped this year because of a new teacher. His main interest is football. He goes to practise every day.”
There has been a major addition to his life in the past five years. His sister Akhanyile was born in September 2010 at the same hospital as Siya, weighing 3.49kg compared with his 2.9kg. Both are healthy, and she is at nursery school. Siya grumbles: “We fight a lot. She always picks on me.”
Nonzuzo sighs and says: “Siya was so happy when she was born. Now they fight all the time. They don’t get on. Even if I give them pocket money for school, I have to pretend I’m giving her five rand and him two rand to keep her happy!”
The family still lives amid a jumble of self-built shacks and fences accessed via a waterlogged dirt track off a main road in Khayelitsha. But with time, they have become incrementally better off. Siya’s father, Benson Ntsimango, now has a full-time job as a bar and restaurant chef, earning 1,200 rand ($95) a week. Last year, their modest home – erected by Benson on land allocated by a local street committee – expanded from one room of 12 sq metres to two: a lounge of 18 sq metres and, separated by a blue curtain, a bedroom of 9 sq metres.
Inside, a naked lightbulb hangs from the corrugated roof. In the lounge are big loudspeakers, a newish sofa (on which Siya sleeps), and a glass coffee table. The kitchen area has a microwave, kettle and wooden cabinets holding glasses. The bedroom has a large TV, a satellite decoder (costing 299 rand a month) and a DVD player, along with baskets of clothes on an old lino floor. Above a double bed is an electricity meter (power costs 150 rand a month).
But it is still bitterly cold in winter and sweltering in summer. The family have to use a pit toilet outside, enclosed by corrugated walls. Discarded crisp packets, eggshells and orange peel are littered on the surrounding grass. In the yard, the ground is partly covered with grimy carpets and a mattress with rusty springs. Clothes are pegged on a washing line and a satellite dish clings to a pole. A dog, called Killer, keeps a wary eye on visitors.
Burglars broke into the house in 2011 and again last year, stealing small items. “They do robberies during the day because everyone is at work and it’s so quiet,” says Nonzuzo. “Muggings happen at night near to us. It’s not a nice neighbourhood because of the crime … and the conditions.
“I want to move away. We can’t stay here for a long time. It’s now more than 10 years, and I’m very worried about the children. My aim is for them to not grow up in that mess. I want a better home for them.”
Nonzuzo’s four sisters and brother failed the matriculation exam at school and are all unemployed. But she passed, and is determined not to become another statistic beaten down by South Africa’s structural flaws. In 2013, she quit her job as a casino waitress, secured a bursary and began a three-year teaching diploma at False Bay College in Cape Town. Next year she hopes to go to the University of Western Cape to study for a bachelor of education degree, which she intends to partly fund by waitressing.
“I want to go and study, instead of earning small money,” she says. “If I had continued as a waitress, I wouldn’t earn much. If you want a proper job you have to get educated, so I decided to get back to studying.”
Nonzuzo also dreams that Benson will put a ring on her finger some day. But first, as custom demands, he must raise about 20,000 rand ($1,540) to pay the lobola, or bride price, to her 63-year-old mother (her father died last year). Nonzuzo is not envious of South Africa’s wealthy elite, however. “If I can do better for myself, I can be more like them. I believe they work hard for where they are.”
For his part, Siya would be happy to relocate to Gauteng province, the country’s economic engine, which includes Johannesburg. “I don’t want to stay here for the rest of my life,” he says. “I want to move to a better place. Gauteng. It’s cool.”
Factfile: South Africa
Under-fives mortality rate (per 1,000 live births): 44
Population living on less than $2 a day: 26% (2011)
Gross domestic product: $349.8bn; gross government debt 46% of GDP
Percentage of children enrolled in primary education, female/male: 91/90 (2008-12)
(Data two years old or less unless indicated)
