Ntuthuko Maphumulo
As South Africa approaches the 25th anniversary of June 16 1976, two schools have been involved in a project to get pupils to understand what National Youth Day is all about.
Project coordinators say that instead of focusing on periodic workshops about the day, their project centres on educating the youth about June 16 on a long-term basis.
Called Involvement of the youth in the 1976 riots, the project was launched by Lycee Francais Jules Verne, in Morningside and Bhukulani Senior Secondary school in Soweto.
Organisers say the project has inspired students and teachers, particularly history teachers, to engage in research and to read about June 16, a turning point in South African history.
They say the use of eyewitnesses to teach young people about June 16 has added value to the project. A number of the country’s youth who were born after the 1970s do not understand the meaning of June 16 and often ask why thousands of young people in Soweto took to the streets to protest against the use of Afrikaans in their schools, say activists involved in the project.
The teachers from Jules Verne and Bhukulani say that South African schools do not offer lessons to students about June 16 because they lack information about the day and they hope that the project will help to encourage teachers to research the events of 1976 and the history of South African political struggle in general.
Coordinators say teachers from Jules Verne and Bhukulani agreed to initiate the project following a visit to historic sites in Soweto early this year. Pupils from Jules Verne and Bhukulani have since visited Morris Issacson High School, which is one of the schools that was in the forefront of the uprising.
The pupils also visited Regina Mundi Catholic Church, which was used as a venue for a number of anti-apartheid meetings and the commemoration of June 16. Other historic sites visited by the pupils include the home of the late Tsietsi Mashinini, the first president of the Soweto student representative council, and the Orlando West home of Nelson Mandela.
The schools have also visited the memorial site of Hector Petersen, who was shot dead during clashes with the apartheid police. Petersen was among hundreds of people who were killed when police fired live shots at the militant youth.
Organisers say that their project portrays the views of the young people who played a major role on the day of the massacre and helps them to confront their future 25 years after that day.
Students are taught how June 16 helped to end a racist education policy and sparked the beginning of a new approach of “liberation before education”. Some people who participate in the project lost family members on June 16.
Others gave up school to help the liberation struggle after they witnessed hundreds of people dying at the hands of police.
Johnny Sexwale, for example, gave up his mid-year exams at Orlando West high school to join the student struggle. He says many young people saw June 16 as the day “we were going to cripple the apartheid government with our stones.
“We burnt all apartheid symbols in the township to show our anger,” he said.
The organisers say studying the history of the apartheid struggle will help instil confidence in the youth and make them proud of their past and understand the reason Youth Day should be commemorated.
The organisers said they hope the education authorities will in future engage the possibility of introducing the history of the struggle against apartheid in the schooling system.
Because of the project, said Bhukulani teacher, Gwen Sibelekwana, “young people are beginning to see Youth Day not as a day of fun but as a day of honouring those boys and girls who lost their lives on June 16”.