Equal Education members picket for safe school plans

POLOKWANE – Angry Equal Education (EE) members handed in a memorandum at Limpopo’s Department of Education to demand that the province’s Norms and Standards Plan be implemented.

This follows after their communication with both the provincial and national departments about this has resulted in no action.

The EE members gathered at the department’s office in Biccard Street in the city where they handed the memorandum of demand over to the MEC of Education, Ishmael Kgetjepe.

The members are unhappy that the provincial plan which was meant to be published along with other provincial plans on Friday, 12 June this year are still not implemented.

“What Limpopo has published so far is not a plan but rather a user-asset management document and this is not what we need to see.

“We have written to the Limpopo Education Department three times this year asking them to publish the plan as required by the regulations. The Department of Basic Education (DBE) is also aware that Limpopo has not published its plan and yet, still nothing has been done to rectify this.”

Nombulelo Nyathela, spokesperson for EE, said the members have already raised their concerns in general about all the provincial implementation plans published so far.

“The EE also brought this to the public’s attention in a press statement two weeks ago but nothing has been done up until now.”

He added one of the concerns that has been highlighted is the delay in the release of the provincial plans hamper community and civil society efforts to assess whether schools have been correctly catered for in accordance with the Norms and Standards Requirements.

Nyathela said with only 15 months left until the end of the first delivery time frame, EE is worried about whether delivery will be timeous and accurate.

“The longer the Limpopo Department of Education delays the plans, the harder it becomes to rectify any serious mistakes in those plans.”

According to him the plans are especially important after the death of Michael Komape, a learner from a local school who died last year when he drowned after he fell into a dilapidated pit latrine at his school.

“The Norms and Standards Regulations can only work to assist conditions at schools like Michael Komape’s school if there is a clear plan on how the work will be done.

“In the absence of this, the provincial department cannot claim to have formulated a strategy to rid the province of unsafe school infrastructure.The longer the delay in fixing school infrastructure continues, the bigger the risk of seeing yet another learner drown in a pit latrine becomes,” Nyathela explained.

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