The causes of poverty are many. In researching the aetiology of poverty, investigators have often drawn attention to factors such as a stagnant local economy, entrenched subsistence economic tradition, lack of supportive infrastructure, markets, capital or technological expertise, or even the prevalence of debilitating diseases. In many parts of rural KwaZulu-Natal where such identifiable causative factors might be present, they have no doubt been exacerbated by the historical fact of apartheid.

During the entrenchment of the apartheid system over a period of nearly fifty years, many who bore the brunt of discriminatory schooling practices adopted the rallying cry: “Liberation before education”, with dire consequences for their own education. Inadequate schooling provision and the deflection of their energies from education to resistance left a legacy of illiteracy and innumeracy amongst many who are now forty or fifty years of age. Although they might have many remaining productive years during which they could enter the formal economy, they remain dogged by the travails of the past.

read more...