Minister Sindisiwe Chikunga addresses South African National Association for Special School
Theme: “Creating an inclusive education legacy”
- Programme director
- School governing body chairpersons and school principals of special schools
- Distinguished delegates
- Ladies and gentlemen, good morning!
1. Greetings, appreciation and introduction
I wish to begin by extending my sincere greetings and heartfelt appreciation to the South African National Association of Special Education (SANASE) and all delegates gathered here this morning. Thank you for your gracious invitation to this 27th Conference of SANASE, convened under the theme: “Creating an Inclusive Education Legacy”. It is truly a joy and an honour for me to be with you today.
My name is Sindisiwe Chikunga. I hail from Mpumalanga Province, was born in KwaZulu-Natal, and currently serve the people of South Africa as Minister in the Presidency responsible for Women, Youth, and Persons with Disabilities.
On behalf of the Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities, I wish to commend the entire leadership of SANASE for hosting this conference as a platform for exchanging knowledge, sharing best practices, and fostering collaboration among stakeholders in the field. Please be assured that this conference has our full support and undivided attention.
Programme director,
In addition to problematising inclusive education as a pillar of a disability-inclusive society, I will, as requested, highlight ways in which we can support special schools to become centres of inclusive excellence that are grounded in progressive international experience but fully contextualised for South Africa’s resource-constrained realities. I will outline our government's position on the rights of persons with disabilities and how these rights find expression in our legislative instruments, policies, initiatives, and programmes aimed at supporting special schools and enhancing inclusivity in education. I will then dedicate a significant part of my remarks to outlining a range of collaborative opportunities I hope to advance with the support, participation, and leadership of the South African National Association of Special Education.
2. The significance of this conference in light of the challenges before us
Programme director, when we speak of creating an inclusive education legacy, we must begin by naming the uncomfortable truth: the greatest barriers faced by learners with disabilities in South Africa do not reside in their bodies or minds, but in the environments we create for them. The obstacle is not the learner’s difference—it is the exclusionary design of our schools, our systems, our curricula and more often than not, our attitudes.
In resource-constrained environments, such as our townships, rural and farming communities, these barriers are magnified across our special schools. Too many of our schools still operate in buildings never designed with accessibility in mind—classrooms without ramps, corridors too narrow for a wheelchair, toilets that cannot be used by a child with mobility needs. These physical impediments are not neutral; they actively exclude. If a child cannot enter a classroom with dignity, the conversation about inclusion has already failed before the lesson begins.
Infrastructure, however, is only one layer of the barriers. Resources—especially assistive devices—remain a critical fault line. In a wealthy suburb, a learner with low vision might have a tablet loaded with accessible learning software. In a rural province, that same learner may wait months for a single Braille textbook, or depend on photocopies from a tired school printer. The right to education without the right to the tools that make learning possible is an empty promise.
Our challenge is compounded by the reality that many teachers have never been adequately prepared for inclusive classrooms. This is not a personal failing of educators—it is a clear systemic failure of our teacher training and professional development pipeline.
Beyond infrastructure and resources, perhaps the most enduring barrier is attitudinal. The very stigma that thrives in our communities remains deeply embedded in our schooling system and communities of practice. In some schools, learners with special needs are too often labelled as “problems” or “extra work.” We have to be clear here: inclusion cannot be built on a foundation of pity or tolerance—it must be built on respect, expectation, and belonging.
Policy, too, is not the problem—it is implementation that continues to falter. The White Paper envisioned a truly inclusive education system, however, without targeted investment, monitoring, and change of attitude, this vision will only exist on paper.
And then there is technology. Artificial intelligence, machine learning, and emerging educational tools hold the potential to radically personalise learning for students with disabilities. Without deliberate strategies to equip special schools with devices, connectivity, and teacher training, we risk building a future where only the wealthy experience the benefits of inclusive technology. This conference must therefore contend with both opportunities and challenges that come with emerging technologies.
We must therefore reframe our approach: inclusion is not about “fixing” the learner to fit the system; it is about fixing the system to embrace every learner.
3. Supporting special schools to become centres of inclusive excellence: best practice from around the world
3.1. We need to transform special schools into resource and support hubs for the entire education ecosystem
In Finland, special schools are not hidden away on the margins—they are regional anchors of inclusion. They provide outreach services, adaptive curriculum resources, and itinerant specialists who travel to mainstream schools to support teachers and learners.
Here in South Africa, this would mean a special school in Limpopo offering Braille transcription for nearby mainstream schools; or a school for learners with hearing impairments in KwaZulu-Natal running sign language workshops for neighbouring teachers. By resourcing special schools to act as knowledge exporters—rather than silos—we multiply their impact across entire districts.
3.2. We need to embed multi-disciplinary teams within special schools
In Canada, for example, leading inclusive schools host multi-disciplinary teams on-site: occupational therapists, speech-language pathologists, psychologists, assistive tech specialists—all working together with teachers.
In our context, too many learners wait years for a single therapy session because services are scattered and overstretched.
Across our country, our provinces must invest in embedding multi-disciplinary teams in every special school—because a child’s development clock does not wait for bureaucracy.
3.3. Our universities need to help position special schools as innovation labs for inclusive pedagogy and technology
In Australia, certain special schools partner with universities, edtech firms, and teacher training colleges to pilot inclusive tools and approaches before scaling them nationally. We can and should do the same here. Let us establish formal partnerships between special schools, higher education, and tech innovators—these three should co-create design solutions that are locally relevant, culturally grounded, and scalable for maximum impact.
3.4. We must build teacher development pipelines where special school expertise trains the wider profession
New Zealand has shown that when special school teachers are seconded into mainstream professional development programmes, inclusive teaching practices spread system-wide.
This means we must create formal, funded systems for special school-to-mainstream teacher mentorship, ensuring that the expertise locked inside special schools becomes a shared national asset.
3.5. Let us leverage special schools as data and knowledge centres for evidence-based policy
In the UK, “centres of excellence” collect and analyse data on learner outcomes, accessibility interventions, and assistive tech usage—data that shapes national policy.
In South Africa, disability inclusion strategies often fail because we lack accurate, disaggregated data. If every special school tracked interventions, measured their impact, and fed that into a national dashboard, we could finally base our policies on real-world evidence.
3.6. We must re-imagine inclusive transition pathways for learners into post-schooling opportunities
In Norway, special schools are working directly with employers, vocational training centres, and tertiary institutions to build tailored transition plans for each learner.
Here at home, too many South African learners with disabilities leave school to face unemployment and isolation. By making transition planning part of the special school’s core mandate—linked to local TVET colleges, community projects, and emerging industries—we ensure learners exit with pathways into work, further study, or entrepreneurship. There is a need to formalise transition programmes in every special school, with employer partnerships and provincial labour market links.
4. Our government’s attitude and legislative instruments towards disability inclusion
4.1. Constitution of the Republic of South Africa (1996)
For South Africa, for this government, disability inclusion has and continues to be a constitutional imperative. For us, disability inclusion is at the heart of the supreme law of the land that guarantees equal rights and prohibits discrimination based on disability. Section 9 ensures equality before the law, while Section 29 guarantees the right to basic education for all, including learners with disabilities—both recognize disability inclusion as a critical enabler of national development.
4.2. International treaties
We did not just ratify the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities with no reservations, we domesticated the convention through a Cabinet-approved White Paper on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. We further ratified the Continental Africa Disability Protocol on Disability as championed by the African Union.
4.3. The National Development Plan
Our National Development Plan (NDP, Vision 2030) recognizes that "disability and poverty operate in a vicious circle" that must be deliberately disrupted. Nothing must be left to chance.
The plan establishes progressive disability equity targets based on the principle that persons with disabilities constitute approximately 12.34% of South Africa's population. With regard to employment equity targets, by 2030, a minimum of 10% of all employment opportunities must be ringfenced for persons with disabilities. Similarly, work is underway to ensure that a minimum of 7% of skills development opportunities are set aside for persons with disabilities.
4.4. Other legislative instruments
Other legislative instruments include:
The South African Schools Act (SASA) No. 84 of 1996; Education White Paper 6, which specifically emphasizes the transformation from special education to inclusive education and the establishment of full-service schools. We also have the Promotion of Equality and Prevention of Unfair Discrimination Act (PEPUDA), which prohibits unfair discrimination in education based on disability and requires reasonable accommodation for learners with disabilities.
As the conference will probably agree, there is a need to fast-track the review of the policies and laws to ensure that they are aligned to the White Paper on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, the UNCRPD and the Sustainable Development Goals.
5. Catalytic projects and areas of partnership between the DWYPD and SANASE
5.1. National Skills Fund (NSF) disability support fund
In 2024, the Department of Higher Education's National Skills Fund launched a R1 billion disability support fund aimed at providing specialized workplace training, capacity building, procurement support and enterprise development for persons living with disabilities.
The success of this funded programme will rely on our department collaborating with experts in the field of disability inclusion. I will therefore be extending an urgent invite to the leadership of SANASE to urgently finalise the investment case behind this initiative. We need to ensure that the resources reach persons with disabilities in all 9 provinces.
5.2. Pairing special schools with SOEs and CSI budgets
One of my passion projects is a legacy initiative that seeks to pair every special school with a state-owned enterprise capable of supporting both the educational and infrastructural needs of our schools.
We hope to bring together the CEOs of state-owned enterprises, sector education and training authorities (SETAs), and industry associations to commit a percentage of their CSI budgets towards turning around the state of special schools and improving the prospects of youth living with disabilities. Let's work together to make this project a reality.
5.3. Circular: meeting the NDP employment equity targets
This financial year, when it comes to meeting the employment equity targets for persons with disabilities, we will leave nothing to chance. Working closely with the DPSA, our Disability Unit has developed a circular to ensure that the 10% target is achieved.
Across the public service, we can no longer plead with our colleagues—those who continue to pay lip service to employment equity will be named and shamed.
However, we cannot achieve this goal alone. We need SANASE and other sister organisations to compile a credible database of persons with disabilities from which departments can readily recruit to meet the minimum target.
5.4. G20 and other multilateral interventions
With South Africa’s G20 presidency underway, we are leveraging our chairship of the Empowerment of Women Working Group to also shine a global spotlight on disability inclusion.
Our aim is to ensure that during and beyond our presidency—both here at home and across all G20 member states—disability inclusion is not a peripheral concern, but is placed at the very centre of all decision-making and action.
Consistent with the G7 Solfagnano Charter, we reaffirm our “unwavering commitment to integrating the rights of persons with disabilities across all political agendas” and take concrete actions to:
- Guarantee universal access and accessibility
- Promote independent living
- Support inclusive education
- Advance decent employment and decent working conditions
- Ensure adaptable, community-based services
- Harness accessible, inclusive new technologies for empowerment and participation
5.5. Disability inclusion research, advocacy and mainstreaming centre of excellence
We have developed an investment case for the establishment of a Disability Inclusion Research, Advocacy and Mainstreaming Centre of Excellence as a legacy project of South Africa's chairship of the G20 Empowerment of Women Working Group.
The Centre will focus on the following priorities:
- Research on mainstreaming the rights of persons with disabilities in financial inclusion, care economy, artificial intelligence, climate change and conducive working conditions
- Establishing a national disability data observatory
- Strengthening data collection and reporting systems across government
- Developing early childhood disability screening protocols
- Enhancing institutional capacity through strengthened disability focal points
- Supporting special schools across South Africa to train teachers, address the digital divide, and improve educational outcomes for learners with disabilities
Programme director,
In conclusion, I wish to end where I began: when we speak of creating an inclusive education legacy, we must begin by naming the uncomfortable truth: the greatest barriers faced by learners with disabilities in South Africa do not reside in their bodies or minds, but in the environments we create for them.
Once again, thank you very much for your kind invitation and I very much look forward to working with you beyond this conference.
I thank you.
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