/ 2 November 2001

There are many mechanisms for consultation in adult education

analysis

Duncan Hindle

Khulekani Mathe raises important issues about the role of adult learners in policy formulation processes, and the extent to which their needs are addressed in those processes (“Is anybody out there listening to the learners?”, October 5).

The Department of Education appreciates his comments in this regard, but wishes to respond.

Mathe asks: “Who sets the agenda for Adult Basic Education and Training [Abet] in South Africa?” He then provides his own reply, to the effect that “Washington, New York and big business do so”.

He is right to ask the question but, sadly, his answer is wrong.

The Department of Education, acting on its constitutional mandate, sets the agenda. We make no apology for this; it is the government’s job to govern. In doing so the government is responding to a wide range of social, economic and political challenges faced by the nation, and developing policies which we believe serve the greatest interest.

But this is not done in isolation: the education department consults widely on all policy issues, as it is obliged to in terms of the National Education Policy Act. And we do take seriously all comments received, even if they cannot all be accommodated.

To this end the directorate responsible for Abet has involved stakeholder constituencies in the development of Abet policies.

With stakeholders we developed the Multi-Year Implementation Plan as a response to the challenges of adult education.

The education department has also made provision for ongoing stakeholder participation in the formation of the National Board for Adult Basic Education and Training, and draft regulations for its establishment were gazetted on August 14 for comment.

We invite stakeholders to all our policy formulation processes, with the understanding that these stakeholders represent a range of constituencies and communities, and it is incumbent on stakeholders to get mandates and to participate based on their constituency needs. We do not dictate to stakeholders who should represent them or how.

The department has also put in place mechanisms for learner participation at different levels. The Abet Act provides for adult learners to play an important role in the governance of a centre, and the same Act obliges the head of department of a province to provide capacity-building programmes for informed learner participation. Experience has shown that it is critical that adult learners’ capacity is built so that they are able to participate meaningfully in governance and in policy development processes. Mathe’s criticism of the Act (that it replicates the Bantu Education Act of 1953) flies in the face of the overwhelming need to regulate and quality assure the provision of Abet.

The article therefore suffers from a poor grasp of the nature of representative democracy in processes set up by government. Consultation processes are meant to solicit stakeholder views on a range of issues, and do not take away the power and responsibility of the department to develop and implement policy. It is disingenuous of Mathe to suggest that stakeholders (including himself) are there to unwittingly legitimate agendas set elsewhere, and I believe it constitutes a gross disrespect to participants to suggest this. His comment about board-rooms and “a few coopted shop stewards” exacerbates this situation.

I would encourage Mathe to meet our newly appointed director for Abet, (who has come to us from a Congress of South African Trade Unions affiliate, incidentally), to allay his suspicions about the role of “big business and financial institutions” in the setting of the Abet agenda. Perhaps then his comments will be more informed and less driven by a personal agenda.

Duncan Hindle is a Deputy Director General at the Department of Education