School desks stolen for scrap metal

DURBAN 21012015 Ngilosi Junior Primary School in Umlazi, where many of the desks and chairs have been stolen. PICTURE: Jacques Naude

DURBAN 21012015 Ngilosi Junior Primary School in Umlazi, where many of the desks and chairs have been stolen. PICTURE: Jacques Naude

Published Jan 22, 2015

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Durban - Pupils of Ngilosi Junior Primary School in Umlazi sat on the dusty floor of their empty classroom without desks and chairs on Wednesday because thieves had ransacked the school during the holidays.

The school takes pupils from Grade R to Grade 4.

Principal Lucky Shange said a parent had warned him last week that thieves were raiding the school – again. The break-ins have happened many times before.

 

“When the guard checked he saw a man and tried to grab him, but the man escaped and climbed over the back fence and ran off,” he said.

The security guard phoned the principal and together they inspected the school.

What they discovered horrified them.

Desks had been dismantled – for scrap metal – and windows were broken.

Shange said five classrooms were affected.

 

For the first day of school on Wednesday the principal divided up the furniture that was left so that each class at least had some desks and chairs. Many children had to sit on the floor.

At the end of the school day the children carried the remaining furniture and stationery to the principal’s office where it was locked up for safekeeping overnight.

 

“In the morning, I have to think which stuff belongs to which teacher,” the principal said.

“The thieves do not do much in the administrative block because there is an alarm system, but they destroy the classrooms.”

In 2007, 20 desktop computers donated by a Malaysian company were stolen.

Then the thieves went for copper, stripping the school inside and out.

In another incident hundreds of chairs were taken.

 

“Whatever we have they take from us.”

Often

suspects were caught, but the prosecutions were never successful.

Shange said there were times he came to the school at midnight to patrol.

“I will be found dead here one day because at 1am I leave my wife and come here.

“At times she comes with me – because I am the one who is accountable.”

The school had a security guard who worked during the day.

Shange said they could not afford night security because the guard had to have a gun so when someone attacked him, he could defend himself.

A parent who was at the school on Wednesday, who declined to give her name, said there was a nearby scrapyard where it was alleged the property was being sold.

“Parents are scared to say in public who has taken the stuff.

“We have suggested that the school put up a suggestion box where parents can write notes to report the culprits.

“Another thing is to go to the scrapyard and suggest that they do not take school property being sold to them.

“Or even conduct a search, if something from the school is found, the scrapyard would have to be closed down,” she said.

The Mercury

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