delays
Evidence wa ka Ngobeni
The Northern Province public service commission has launched a probe into alleged irregularities involving the selection of prescribed textbooks for the province’s schools – irregularities that could lead to serious delays in textbooks reaching pupils.
This comes less than a week after Minister of Education Kader Asmal announced the appointment of an interdepartmental task team to conduct a nationwide investigation into the government’s textbook selection and procurement systems.
Department of Education representatives said that for the past few years some provincial governments have failed to effectively administer textbook and stationary tenders.
In the Northern Province a group of Sepedi authors have accused officials at the Provincial Language Council (PLC), which falls under the provincial education department, of corruption, bias and failure to follow proper procedures when compiling a list of Sepedi textbooks. The list, which consists of literature textbooks for the 2001/2005 interim syllabuses, has been distributed to schools.
The group, which identifies itself as the Concerned Group of Sepedi Authors, claims the PLC officials downplayed an initial list of Sepedi textbooks which was compiled using independent assessors, and flouted the normal selection procedures.
The textbooks are destined for grades nine, 10, 11 and 12 syllabuses in the next five years and there are growing fears that textbook distribution may be affected by the debacle.
Northern Province Provincial Commissioner Koko Mokgalong, who is presiding over the investigation, wants a full report from the provincial education department regarding procedures used to select school textbooks.
Mokgalong said the protesting Sepedi authors also claim some authors, who have been shortlisted by the council, only submitted manuscripts.
A representative of the group, Bishop Makobe, said some “corrupt” officials from the PLC – most of whom are authors and publishers themselves – had lobbied members of a final prescribing committee to secure approval for their own titles. Makobe said PLC officials who are writers used pseudonyms in order to appear as new writers in Sepedi.
The group is demanding that members of the PLC be axed and the original list of prescribed textbooks be reinstated.
Mokgalong said her commission would call PLC officials for a public hearing soon after receiving a report from the provincial education department.
Northern Province education representative Rapule Matsane this week said his department had set up a meeting with the protesting Sepedi authors to address their grievances.