Johannesburg - Protest actions by aggrieved parents and community members caused disruptions at some inland schools that opened for the first day of the new school year on Wednesday.
On the first day of school, one usually expects to see anxious smiles from learners who step into high schools for the first time, smiles and tears alike from parents who had to let go of their children entering Grade 1 for the first time.
Collectively, all of these experiences, as daunting as they may be, are also meant to be pleasing. Instead, incidents of fear, frustration and anger, coupled with protest action, are what some parents and children at some of the schools had to endure.
Parents at Mdelwa Hlongwane Primary School in Pimville, Soweto, protested outside the school, blocked the school gates and denied their children access to the classrooms. The reason is they claimed that the school's infrastructure was “unstable” and “unsafe” for their children.
At Phumzile Primary School in Phiri, also in Soweto, parents were locked outside the school premises while they demanded answers about learner placements.
Parents claimed their children were not placed in the nearest schools and raised concerns that their children have to pass and cross the main road when they could have just been placed in the area closest to them.
A similar protest incident happened in Balfour, Mpumalanga, where parents staged a protest outside Setsheng Secondary School, claiming that the state of the school was not safe for their children.
The SGB chairperson Deon Makhoba told eNCA that the Setsheng Secondary School was supposed to have been demolished three years ago so that the reconstruction of the new building could get underway.
"The drawings are ready, we don't know exactly where the delay is, but it is with the department, because they are the ones who are supposed to fund the new building," he said.
Makhoba said the delay is costly for them because they have pupils who are doing science subjects, and there is no laboratory for them to do their practicals.
"They are only doing science in theory, but there is no practical happening. It is affecting their teachers, who are running up and down from one school to another, which is costing them from their pocket," he added.
Meanwhile, IOL followed up on the Gauteng parents in Kempton Park who raised frustrations about their children still not being placed hours before the first day of school.
The MEC for Education in Gauteng Matome Chiloane gave an update on learner placements on Tuesday at Hoerskool Jeugland in Kempton Park, Ekurhuleni, on Tuesday.
One of the aggrieved parents, who asked not to be named, said there had been some progress so far as some of the learners were placed this morning in other schools.
She said she hoped that by Friday, every learner would be placed accordingly.
There were 501 learners who were not placed in Kempton Park.
Education