Solidarity rejects Amendment Bill at public hearing
5 May 2023
Solidarity today rejected the proposed Basic Education Laws Amendment Bill (BELA Bill) during a public hearing and expressed its disgruntlement towards the government. This step in the public participation process follows the parliamentary presentations of November 2022 in which Solidarity also participated.
Solidarity argues that the proposed Amendment Bill in its current format will result in the centralisation of education in South Africa implying disregarding the power of governing bodies in schools. Language and admissions policies are influenced by this, which makes Afrikaans schools a direct target of this lust for power.
“Daily we hear and see the open hostility towards Afrikaans schools and their right to exist. There is an active attack against mother tongue education even if this attack holds negative consequences for innocent children,” Johnell van Vollenhoven, policy analyst at the Solidarity Research Institute said. “This Amendment Bill seeks to take the power from parents and governing bodies. Through this they can freely implement their ideology as part of daily education in our schools and turn every Afrikaans school into an English school within just a few years.”
According to Solidarity the BELA Bill seeks to return to the outdated school model. The government wants to reduce the role of the community and especially governing bodies and let all power revolve upwards. This change is contrary to objective of the South African Schools Act (SASA) that communities and parents, through governing bodies, can manage schools in the best interest of the learners.
Solidarity considers participation in public processes to be extremely important and of crucial importance in its fight for justice within the public education sector.
“The government is trying very hard to hijack our schools. We simply cannot stand back and watch on. They are deliberately ignoring leading research on the importance of mother tongue education because they want blind hostility towards a minority to prevail instead. The governemnt is obsessed with power. It wants to control us on every level, now even through our children and schools. We simply cannot tolerate the hijacking of schools and will not hesitate to proceed with legal action if he persists against all advice. The future of our children is in our hands and our schools remain community property,” Connie Mulder, Head of the Solidarity Research Institute concluded.
Issued by Connie Mulder, Head: Solidarity Research Institute (SRI), 5 May 2023
