Johannesburg - Labour federation Cosatu has thrown its weight behind protests against some schools' racial policies, calling for widespread change to accelerate the transformation of the country’s schooling system.
It said on Monday that the protests were long overdue and that more was needed to be done to tackle racial discrimination in the country instead of incident driven responses by the Department of Education.
“We also do not believe that the current firefighting and piecemeal approach by the Department of Basic Education is what will bring about real democratic representation in the school governance,” said Cosatu spokesman Sizwe Pamla.
“While we acknowledge that students, parents and teachers now have democratic organisations available through which they can take over education, it is obvious that the presence of these organs of people’s power is not enough to help overhaul the apartheid apparatus that continues to strangulate our education and cultural life.”
Cosatu said that the solution to the scenes seen last week, which started with protests at Pretoria Girls High School, was for change from below.
It said that all stakeholders, the government, parents and civil society, should work together to ensure that school governance guidelines and protocols were based upon the principles of co-operation, critical thinking and civic responsibility.
But this should not only be left in the government's hands but should encompass policy formulation and curriculum development.
“The current top down approach to education has shown less confidence in people’s governing organs in South African schools. Cosatu wants the government to recognise education as very fundamental for social development and justice, and therefore protect the education sector from privatisation and commercialization,” said Pamla.
Labour Bureau