The ANCYL said it would talk to the department of basic education to identify the root causes of bullying and to seek solutions. (David Harrison, M&G)
Bullying in schools is a foreign concept to South African education and requires intervention, the ANC Youth League (ANCYL) said on Sunday.
"School bullying is foreign in the South African schooling history. It is not part of our heritage and culture," ANCYL spokesperson Bandile Masuku said in a statement.
The ANCYL condemned recent reports of children being bullied and of children "bullying" teachers.
The Sowetan reported on Thursday that a 16-year-old boy was forced to leave Hoërskool Transvalia, in Vanderbijlpark, because of constant bullying.
The boy's mother complained that a group of bullies called him a "kaffir", stripped him naked, asked what a "kaffir" was doing at a white school, and forced him to drink his own urine.
The South African Human Rights Commission was looking into the case and had requested a report on it from the Gauteng education department.
Root causes
In a separate incident on Wednesday, a grade eight pupil allegedly attacked a teacher at Glenvista High School, south of Johannesburg. A classmate filmed the attack.
The footage, which went viral the following day, shows the pupil unsuccessfully trying to retrieve what looks like a school bag from the teacher.
After failing to get it back, he hits and kicks the teacher, then throws a chair and a broomstick at the teacher as he walks out of the classroom.
Masuku said that the ANCYL would talk to the department of basic education to identify the root causes of bullying and to seek solutions.
"We will meet our comrades in [the] Congress of South African Students to discuss means and ways of preserving discipline and orderly conduct in school pupils.
"We call on school governing bodies to ensure that in each school there are programmes targeting moral regeneration," he said. – Sapa