Johannesburg - Some communities have attempted to shut down the Gauteng Department of Education’s plans to build public schools in their areas despite the high demand for new schools in some parts of the province.
Briefing the media on the province’s readiness for the 2015 academic year on Wednesday, Education MEC Panyaza Lesufi said the department’s plans to build new schools in Woodmead and Glenvista had encountered resistance.
“In the Tshwane area, we’ve got pressures around Centurion, and at the Centurion-Woodmead corridor, there are a substantial number of new pupils who want to (enrol there),” he said.
“We have no choice but to build a new alternative technology school around Woodmead or else that area will not have a school to accommodate all the children…
“I must put it on record that the DA and the communities around that area have shown me a middle finger (and said) they won’t support me in building a new school,” Lesufi said.
“For me, education comes first, politics comes later. We want a school there and we’ll build that school,” he said, adding that anyone who stood in the department’s way would be taken to court.
“We have been building schools using alternative technology and I’ve never been stopped, they’re all over the province… I’ve given officials the go-head and we’ll build that school.
“I’m hopeful that by February that school will be opened, unless the courts tell me what I’m doing is wrong.”
He said Glenvista was experiencing a similar scenario.
“I’ve been stopped… by the DA as well as people who claim to be community members who want to be consulted. I’ve never had that thing… When an area develops, there is a site that’s assigned to be a school site. I don’t understand this new phenomenon, where people say I must consult them first,” Lesufi said.
He said a total of 16 new schools would be ready for intake by January.
DA spokesman for Gauteng education Khume Ramulifho said it was incorrect to say the DA was opposed to the construction of new schools.
He said its concern was that the department had not planned properly for the provision of the new schools and, in the process, flouted municipal by-laws that regulated infrastructural developments.
“What we are saying is that the department is not above the law, it must comply with municipal regulations. If something happens to these buildings, who would be held responsible? Who approved the (building) plans?”
Ramulifho said that in addition to the violation of the municipal by-laws, councillors were not informed of the construction of new schools in their own wards, and when residents enquired about the developments, the councillors could not provide answers.
The Star