The Department of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta) has gazetted the fees payable to initiation schools in all nine provinces.
The fees are applicable for male and female initiates, their parents, as well as traditional surgeons involved in initiation practices.
Costs vary across provinces, with the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) being the most and least pricey, respectively.
Cogta Minister Velenkosini Hlabisa signed the gazette this week in line with the Customary Initiation Act of 2021.
“After consultation with the premiers of all provinces, the National House of Traditional Leaders, all provincial houses of traditional leaders and the minister of health determine the fees to be paid for customary initiation as contained in the schedule hereto.”
Cost of initiation schools
While male and female initiates have separate fees in most provinces, the gazette states that no fees are due to traditional surgeons for female initiates.
The relevant fees are payable by a prospective initiate and their parents to the principal of an initiation school to attend the school.
Inland provinces
In the Free State, male and female initiates will need to pay R4 000 each, with parents exempt from paying a separate fee.
Traditional surgeons in the Free State will be owed at least R300 per male operated on during the initiation process.
In Gauteng, male initiates face a fee of R3 500 per enrolment, with females owing R2 500 each.
Parents of male initiates must pay an extra R500 per child, as well as an extra R300 owed to the traditional surgeon. Parents of female initiates in Gauteng are exempt from extra fees.
The North-West has a rate of R3 500 for both male and female initiates, and R800 for the traditional surgeon, with no additional fees due from the parents.
Mpumalanga has the same R4 000 per child rate for males and females, with no extra fees due to the traditional surgeon or by parents.
Like Mpumalanga, no extra fees are due to traditional surgeons or by parents, but males and females pay R3 500 and R2 000 each, respectively.
Coastal provinces
In the Eastern Cape, parents are not mandated to pay an extra fee, while the traditional surgeon is owed R1 500 per male.
Male and female initiates in the Eastern Cape will both pay R3 500 each.
The Northern Cape stipulates payments of R3 000 for males and R2 500 for females, with no extra fees for parents.
However, initiation schools are to adhere to a group rate for traditional surgeons.
“R200 per initiate in the case of male initiation where an initiation school has 200 or less initiates. A maximum amount of R10 000 per traditional surgeon, in the case of male initiation where an initiation school has 200 or more initiates,” the gazette clarifies.
The Western Cape has the highest fees in the country, stipulating R5 000 for males and R4 500 for females.
Traditional surgeons are due R800 per male, and parents are charged no additional fee.
KZN is the only province to make a distinction between tribes; no fees are mandatory for traditional surgeons or payable by parents.
Batlokwa and Makgolokwe Basotho initiates in KZN are required to pay R1 800 per male or female, while Sotho and AmaHlubi initiates must pay R2 000, regardless of gender.
Need for regulation
The regulation of fees became necessary following the increasing prevalence of initiation schools operating primarily for profit.
A 2023 report by the Cultural, Linguistic and Religious Rights Council outlined a need to focus on the meaning of initiations over their profitability.
“The initiation rite has become a commercialised practice, which often provides a source of income for many young people.
“Their motive is not necessarily to entrench respect for culture and its dignity, but to pursue simple monetary gain.
“This results in the neglect of the cultural rules of the initiation practice,” the report stated.
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