Restructuring a new education department has not yet begun, and the ‘old guard’ is still firmly in place, reports Philippa Garson
THERE is growing alarm at the slow pace of change in the Ministry of Education, which is paralysed by a power vacuum and still in the grip of “old guard” apartheid era bureaucrats.
While educationists acknowledge it is early days yet, they are nevertheless concerned that the slow movement in a sector where expectations are exceedingly high could backfire on the new government.
The proposed Commission on Higher Education — due to make urgent recommendations on the funding problems in universities — is still not up and running. And this despite a looming crisis in the tertiary sector, with the impending exclusion of more students who hope to return to the historically black universities next week without having paid their fees.
Restructuring of a new education department has not begun in any visible way and the old departments and lines of command are still in place, educationists complained this week.
Minister Sibusiso Bengu’s absence due to illness and the lack of a director-general have compounded the problem; and neither acting education minister Steve Tshwete nor deputy minister Renier Schoeman are “education people”.
Bengu is expected to return to work next month, but many fear he has neither the resilience nor the political authority to manage such a key portfolio.
Restructuring the education departments into one department with satellite regions is one of the most difficult transitional tasks ahead. Coupled with this is a highly charged, politicised constituency.
Says one source: “We need a minister with political authority to deal with the volatile teacher and student sectors. Bengu doesn’t have the political credentials”
While Bengu has a strategic management team — comprising five ANC educationists and four drawn from the existing government departments — its work is hampered by the fact that his key advisors from the ANC are working as consultants and not full-time employees.
Nico Cloete, the outgoing general-secretary of the Union of Democratic University Staff Associations, blames the Public Service Commission for thwarting the official appointment of a new director-general and staff to drive the process.
While other ministers have ridden roughshod over protocol and appointed who they wanted, Bengu is “playing it too much by the book”, says one source.
Without a director-general there are no new lines of command and, according to an education official, “the old bureaucrats are running rings around everyone else”. Ralph du Preez, former deputy director- general of the old Department of Education and Training, is acting director-general until a new appointment is made.
According to Lincoln Mali, a spokesman for Bengu, the applicants must appear before a panel before the Public Service Commission appoints a new director-general. Although it was expected that ANC education head John Samuel would get the job, he was overlooked and has now all but left the ministry.
Though Mali does not confirm this, academic and former Turfloop rector Chabane Manganyi is likely to step into the position. There is, however, little enthusiasm about his management skills and, like Bengu, Manganyi has remained outside the policy debates and confrontational politics of the past.
Despite plans discussed with the minister for the swift intervention in the funding crisis affecting students “we’ve seen nothing yet”, says Desmond Thompson of the National Education Co-ordinating Committee.
In the absence of the appointment of a commission on higher education and with continuing silence on statements of intent, “you can expect our constituency to become restless”, he warns.
South African Students Congress secretary-general Mahlengi Bhengu says the looming crisis in universities means there is an urgent need for a funding conference. Nothing can be done unless government plays a central role.