Johannesburg - Better discipline in schools could have prevented the death of an East Rand teenager killed in a school shooting, the African Christian Democratic Party said on Thursday.
ACDP leader Kenneth Meshoe said in a statement school discipline was needed to curb behavioural problems and violence.
On Tuesday, a Grade 11 pupil brought his mother's firearm to Phineas Xulu Secondary School, in Vosloorus, and shot dead a pupil he accused of bullying him.
“A Grade 10 pupil is reported to have said that if the school had taken action against (the alleged bully) and his friends a long time ago, then their fellow pupil would not have been killed,” Meshoe said.
Reports that other pupils had expressed relief at the boy's killing were also cause for alarm, he said.
“Whatever measures have been introduced to replace corporal punishment (are) not effective.”
The ACDP sent condolences to the family of the teenager who was killed.
Earlier, the Gauteng Congress of SA Students (Cosas) said it would begin its own searches of students following the shooting.
“We have resolved to take matters into our own hands; as students we will protect each other from each other and from criminals,” it said in a statement.
Cosas sub-branches were told to “stand guard and search learners every morning at the gate”.
Cosas said it was “deeply horrified” over the shooting and took the provincial government to task for not providing a safe learning environment.
They also claimed that the local Community Policing Forum had been denied access to the school because staff said they were disrupting teaching. - Sapa