Johannesburg - President Jacob Zuma is not “fit to serve” on the UN education panel because of the “destruction” of the school system on his watch, says the DA.
“As long as Zuma has accepted a position like this, he remains in denial that we have a poor education system, one that is almost in implosion,” DA spokeswoman on basic education Annette Lovemore said on Thursay.
Zuma has been invited by UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon at the General Assembly meeting in New York to take part in the UN Education First initiative. Zuma accepted and is one of 10 inaugural member state champions of the initiative.
The members would provide support to the secretary-general to ensure the success of the initiative, the Presidency said.
“South Africa will, in essence, be strategically positioned to ensure that education projects that may accrue from this initiative benefit countries in southern Africa and the African region,” it said.
But Lovemore said:” The only value Zuma could add to the panel is to show the world how not to manage education systems.”
She said Zuma had overseen a “crumbling” education system, marked by failures, such as:
* The Limpopo textbook crisis.
* Rampant teacher vacancies, 64 752 of them in the Eastern Cape.
* Lack of basic education infrastructure, as 22 938 schools did not have stocked libraries, 21 021 did not have laboratories and 19 037 lacked computer centres.
* The dismal quality of education, with SA ranked 140 out of 144 countries in the World Economic Forum Global Competitiveness Report for 2012/13.
* The high repeat rate – 1 231 083 pupils had to repeat grades last year.
* Only 38 percent of all pupils who started Grade 2 in 2001 passed matric last year.
Political Bureau