Western Cape education authorities were hard at work on Wednesday trying to avert an impending education crisis in the province.
Meanwhile, pupils, parents and organisations marched in various areas to highlight their unhappiness with the status quo, which includes overcrowding and, in some schools, a delayed beginning to the academic year.
And Western Cape provincial education minister Andre Gaum condemned an earlier Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) march calling for his resignation.
”I condemn this action on the part of Cosatu in the strongest possible terms. They have taken learners out of the school during school hours, and are jeopardising our efforts at providing accommodation for these learners,” he said in a statement.
Trouble broke out at Masiphumelele Secondary School in the Cape Town metropole’s south district with pupils staging a mass protest on the Kommetjie road near Noordhoek, stoning cars and holding hostage an education department official and members of the school governing board for a few hours. The pupils were unhappy with the overcrowding and lack of proper facilities at the school.
Regional education department spokesperson Paddy Attwell said Western Cape departmental officials are in the process of working out a solution for the school.
They met with the school’s governing body on Tuesday to suggest using local school halls as a temporary measure and on Wednesday the education department’s metropole south district met in what Attwell described as a ”standard” meeting.
Attwell said that the department will be holding discussions with the managers of the community halls, because there was ”a process involved”.
Asked about the situation in other areas, such as Mfuleni, Attwell said each incident has its own peculiarities, ”and these have to be addressed taking into account particular local situations.
”In Mfuleni we are trying to persuade the community to report to the Mfuleni Primary School until such time as mobile classrooms are in place. These are expected to be in place by February 16,” he said.
Gaum said the majority of parents agreed in a meeting on Tuesday night to teaching learners in double shifts while vandalised classrooms were repaired.
He said that the department of public works was also asked to attend to the necessary repairs at Norwood Central Primary School.
Earlier on Wednesday, about 500 disgruntled parents and their children gathered in front of the Western Cape provincial legislature to hand over a memorandum to the education department calling for a ”rescue plan”.
”We as parents are very upset at the conditions at our school. No classes have taken place since school started two weeks ago, and our children have to sit outside,” said parent Robert Philander.
South African Democratic Teachers Union provincial secretary Don Pasquallie said Gaum has shown that he is only interested in ”rich schools” and not schools in impoverished areas.
Pasquallie said the problem is not confined to Elsies River, but prevails in areas such as Phillippi and Mfuleni, where pupils are also not accommodated.
Cosatu regional secretary Tony Ehrenreich said Gaum is ”not the man for the job”.
Ehrenreich said the problems at Norwood school had been highlighted to the provincial minister about eight months ago, but nothing had been done to provide adequate class facilities. Conditions were further exacerbated by acts of vandalism during the December holidays. — Sapa
Cape parents protest