What does Youth Day mean to you?

“Amandla” writes:

(File photo).

One could be forgiven for thinking that Youth Day is all about Hector Pieterson, his sister Antoinette Sithole and Mbuyisa Makhubo.

Send your letters to bctletters@caxton.co.za.

Everyone within and beyond the borders of South Africa saw Sam Nzima’s colossal photograph of a lifeless youngsters from Soweto being held bravely by a fellow contemporary, brazenly dodging bullets from a racist regime, with his sister almost perpetually frozen in shock and motion.

This picture in and of itself was not Youth Day, but rather an excellent metaphor for what the apartheid regime stood for and achieved.

This was to destroy a nation by depriving them of quality education.

The youth of 40 years ago understood that quality education was the foundation to dignity.

Sadly, this self-evident principle was equally understood by the apartheid despot and architect Hendrik Verwoerd.

Our education system is deeply divided along racial lines, blacks still receive a relatively inferior education compared to their white counterparts.

Thankfully, under the democratic government this is radically improving, especially in Gauteng under MEC Panyaza Lesufi.

Education analysts, government critics and even couch potatoes blame some of the challenges in our education system on teachers.

Teachers are not at school on time, they say; the South African Democratic Teachers Union (SADTU) is too powerful, or, the recurrent one: the teachers in black schools are just clueless.

There might be some truth to some of these shallow critics, but the criticism is void of one fundamental truth.

Apartheid deftly set its foundation, which even the most progressive of governments would struggle to remove.

Under the plight of apartheid, being a teacher in a black community was the ceiling for most black South Africans.

Dreaming of any other profession was laughable; it require immense sacrifice, bravery and even martyrdom, similar to that of Nelson Mandela and Steve Biko.

Thank you to the martyrs and reluctant teachers who made a sacrifice to build a just nation.