Kuruman learners: multiple victims of crime and of ANC service delivery inertia

25 September 2014

The parliamentary portfolio committee on Basic Education visited the John Taolo Gaetsewe education district this week. I represented the DA on the trip. I have come away outraged at the infringement of the constitutional rights suffered by the learners in the schools of this district.

The DA calls on the President to form an inter-ministerial task team, to deal with every aspect of the anger and apparent political manoeuvring of the Road Forum and the communities it represents. He cannot allow children to be prevented from attending school for any service delivery reason. Their education is simply too important. 

On 5 June, schools in the district were closed by the so-called Road Forum. Serious intimidation tactics were used to prevent schooling. Every attempt to encourage teachers to teach or parents to send their children to school was met with threats and, in the case of four schools, the burning down of their admin blocks.

We met with members of the Road Forum. We were told that they had been elected by their communities (including the parents of schoolchildren in those communities) and mandated to protest for the building of a 720km long network of tar roads. The Road Forum attempted to present the MEC for Public Works with a petition, and when nobody arrived to receive their petition, they embarked on a protest using learners as their weapons.

Road Forum members stated, at our meeting, that they had no option but to carry out the mandate given to them, even if they did not like it. They expressed shock that the Minister Minister of Basic Education, Angie Motshekga, has called on the Police Services to make arrests -  this, they said, was unacceptable since they had not been consulted. 

There are two charges of preventing learners from attending school against them (the first of these laid by the DA), and four charges of arson.  

The Road Forum would provide no guarantee that they would not use the same protest methodology if the road construction does not progress as desired (which it is unlikely to do). 

The DA cannot condone what the Road Forum has done, or what the comunity it represents has allowed to happen. But we can understand the complaint,  made over and over again, of neglect by the government. Promises have been made to this community since 2001, and none have been kept. The people are beyond angry, and beyond reason. When I stated that keeping children out of school was not acceptable means of protest, I was asked what I would suggest. Changing your vote might work. Vote for a DA government that actually does deliver on its promises.

Learners returned to school on Monday, having missed almost 4 months of schooling. But only some have returned.  The transport for many has not yet been reinstated. And, at 46 of the 54 affected schools, teachers had not returned. The lack of transport and teachers is symptomatic of an education department that has displayed little more than handwringing during the entire protest period.

The Head of Department told our committee that the realisation of the right to education rests with the parents. If parents decide to withhold that right, there is nothing he can do. He said further : "that responsibility cannot be taken up by me or any other official. We are just bureaucrats . Ours is to ensure that schools are running. We have to keep to our mandate."What utter nonsense. He had a resonsibility to intervene, as did the MEC for Education, as did the Minister. All of them sat back, and believed every rumour that sprang up about the protests ending because it excused their inaction.

And now the children are back at school, which we welcome. But it is too late for any meaningful intervention. No amount of extra classes or camps will allow any of the 17000 children to progress to the next grade.

Community representatives and unions are calling for the children to be given a chance - for concerted effort to be made to allow those who could pass to do so. But learners were allowed to pass in 2012 after a similar break in their schooling as a result of a protest over the same road, and, according to the HoD, the gaps in their knowledge are very evident and are affecting their learning now and will in future. So either the learners pass, and accumulate an even greater knowledge gap, or they fail, and repeat their grades. Neither option is desirable, and neither is the fault of the children. 

The children of JohnTaolo Gaetsewe district are multiple victims - of crime and of the dysfunctional ANC government. 

The reasons are clearly multi-faceted. These communities have suffered serious neglect. 

Someone has to take responsibility for ensuring that there is no recurrence of the John Taolo Gaetsewe scenario, in the Northern Cape or anywhere in the country.

Education is the country's apex priority, pronounced so by President Zuma. It is him, therefore, who must bear the responsibiluty of appropriate action.

Statement issued by Annette Lovemore MP, DA Shadow Minister Basic Education, September 25 2014

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