SADTU dismisses AfriForum’s racist venom

26 November 2019

The South African Democratic Teachers’ Union (SADTU) in Gauteng has noted with outrage the Afriforum letter sent to the Premier of Gauteng Province, Honourable David Makhura dated 20 November 2019. This grouping seeks to drag us into its racist fight against the MEC for Education and Youth Development, Honourable Panyaza Lesufi.

The fact that Afriforum calls us 'South African Democratic Teachers Association' exposes its laughable utter ignorance. SADTU is a product of genuine struggles of the majority of the people to liberate us from the clutches of apartheid and colonialism which was engineered by the predecessors of Afriforum.

We are not apologetic about being the major stakeholder in education. We draw our existence from the Constitution and our membership constitutes the majority of teachers and education workers who believe that our union is the legitimate tool to pursue education transformation in our country.

We fully support the education transformation interventions spearheaded by our MEC and HOD. The deployment of modern resources and the building of proper and adequately resourced schools in townships is highly commendable. These resources were previously enjoyed by the white minority.

We support the MEC's assault on racism as this advances the will of the people as espoused in the Constitution. We are fully behind him as he breaks racist barriers created by the Afriforum constituency. It remains our contention that no learner must be barred from accessing a public school on the basis of language and/or race. Despite the small glitches, the online system has destroyed the manipulative racist admission criteria set by some reactionary school principals and School Governing Bodies (SGBs) which denied many learners access to public schools of their choice. We commend the Gauteng Department of Education for the huge progress made in the placement of learners; 'the doors of learning and culture shall be open to all'.

We are part of Eldoradopark Secondary school as majority of teachers at the school are our members. The school principal and some SGB members rented a mob to intimidate teachers and the affected teachers were forced to leave the school and reported at the district office. No single teacher absconded as alleged in the letter. The conduct of teachers is an employer-employee matter and it is regulated by legislation. It can't be turned into a political football by this racist grouping. We stand ready to defend our members.

Issued by Tseliso Ledimo, Provincial Secretary, SADTU, 26 November 2019