DIRK VAN ZYL, Cape Town | Tuesday
SEXUAL abuse of schoolgirls by teachers and members of the community was rife in South Africa, with one case reported of a teacher who impregnated 20 girls at one Eastern Cape school, the National Council of Provinces members were told on Tuesday.
The NCOP’s education select committee have received a draft report of public hearings conducted in five provinces by provincial standing committees on education.
Committee members are to study the report which still has to be edited, and will then discuss it on February 12 before tabling it in Parliament with recommendations.
Public hearings were held in North West, Northern Cape, Eastern Cape, Free State and Mpumalanga, while a report is still being awaited from Gauteng, which held its hearings on November 12 last year.
The Western Cape had a special debate on the subject in its legislature last year.
According to the draft report, an example had been cited of a teacher at the Ntabeni Secondary School in the Eastern Cape having been accused of having affairs with schoolgirls, and having impregnated 20 at that school.
The matter had been reported to the community by pupils but the community was divided on the issue because some parents benefited from these acts.
The principal had reported the teacher to the school governing body but it could not take action ”because parents of the victims do not talk about this, while some get financial support from the educators”.
”The local youth intervened and demanded that the educator must be dismissed, as his behaviour will have a negative impact on the performance of the school.”
The report lists figures of sexual abuse cases – including rape, indecent assault and abduction in some of the provinces, but notes that ”most of the cases are not reported”.
Among recommendations made by provinces is one from Mpumalanga that sexual violence be declared a priority crime.
It also proposes that sex education be taught in schools and homes ”in languages understood by those receiving the lessons” and that the education department should immediately dismiss all those engaged sexually with children.
The province further notes that some children prostitute themselves for money because of poverty and in some cases girls do not come to school because they are being kept as sex slaves by elderly people for very little or no payment.
In the Eastern Cape a case of sodomy of boys aged between nine and 12 by a white adult male had been reported.
The case was being investigated by the police but had been dragging on for a long time, the draft report says. – Sapa
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