<div dir="ltr"><h3 id="gmail-DailyNewsHeadline">Hoërskool Overvaal: Lesufi's awful record</h3>
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Sara Gon |
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24 January 2018
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Sara Gon says the Gauteng education MEC recklessly lights and feeds racial fires
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<p class="gmail-Body"><b><span lang="EN-US">Send in the Scoundrels</span></b></p>
<p class="gmail-Body">To misquote Samuel Johnson, anti-white racism is the
last refuge of the scoundrel. In this sorry tale, there are a number of
scoundrels.</p>
<p class="gmail-Body"><span lang="EN-US"></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">The first is Member of the
Elective Council (MEC) for Education in Gauteng, Panyaza Lesufi. To some
in the local media, Lesufi is a superstar – articulately and in dulcet
tones slaying white, racist dragons in schools for violating the rights
of their black victims.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">Except this crusader often lights the racial fires or feeds the conflagration. But his besotted media following takes his word.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">Lesufi did this with <a href="http://politicsweb.co.za/opinion/phsg-was-it-all-as-it-seems">Pretoria High School for Girls</a>. In the </span><span lang="NL">Koeitjies En Kalfies pre-school</span><span lang="NL"> </span><span lang="EN-US"><a href="http://www.politicsweb.co.za/news-and-analysis/panyaza-lesufi-addicted-to-nonracialism-or-racebai">debacle</a>,
his reaction was a knee-jerk allegation of racism deduced from a photo
on social media. Lesufi tweeted that he was going there to “face-off
with racists”. </span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">As with Pretoria Girls, Lesufi
invited his 29 000 Twitter followers to join him in confronting the
school. As if this wasn’t bad enough,</span><span lang="EN-US"> </span><span lang="EN-US">h</span><span>e re-t</span><span lang="EN-US">weeted photos of the toddlers</span><span>‚ </span><span lang="EN-US">which enabled the public to identify them.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">Now he has tarred Hoërskool Overvaal with the brush of racism to hide the GDE’s incompetence and failures. </span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">On 9 January 2018, the school
approached the North Gauteng High Court for an urgent application to
overturn a Gauteng Department of Education’s (GDE) decision to force the
school to accept 55 pupils who wanted to be taught in English</span><span>.</span><span lang="EN-US">
The school argued that it had reached capacity; the GDE argued that it
had used language to exclude the 55. It is not within the scope of this
article to deal with the judgment in detail, but the reference is below.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span>Among the emotionally manipulative statements contained in the GDE’s response to Overvaal’s application were the following: </span><span lang="EN-US">“Language
could not be used to segregate pupils”; “The school's Afrikaans-only
language policy was previously rejected by the education department”,
and that “Afrikaans was a language that symbolised ‘sorrow and tears to
the majority of those (of) whom it was not their mother tongue’”</span><span>.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">These comments are in breach of the South African Schools Act 84 of 1996 (SASA) and the </span><span lang="NL">Gauteng Schools</span><span lang="EN-US">’ Education Act 6 of 1995 (</span><span>“</span><span lang="EN-US">The Act</span><span>”).</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">Overvaal is an Afrikaans-medium
school. Its refusal to accommodate the 55 was because the school was
already at capacity, with pupils who accepted Afrikaans as the medium of
instruction, including black children. A single-medium school cannot
become a dual-medium school overnight. </span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">The Act sets out grounds for
admission: Section 18 (A) provides that the governing body must
determine the language policy of the school subject to the Constitution
and SASA.</span><span lang="EN-US"> </span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">Section 18</span><span>(2) </span><span lang="EN-US">obliges
the governing body to submit a copy of the language policy to the MEC
for vetting and noting. If at any time the MEC believes that the
language policy of a public school does not comply with the Act’s </span><span>princip</span><span lang="EN-US">les
or the Constitution, the MEC, after consultation with the governing
body, may direct that the language policy of the school be reformulated
(Section 18(3)).</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">SASA states: “The governing body
of a public school may determine the language policy of the school
subject to the Constitution, this Act and any applicable provincial law.
No form of racial discrimination may be practised in implementing
policy determined under this section.”</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">So if a school refuses to admit a
pupil because he is black, it is unfair discrimination. If the school
refuses admission to a pupil who refuses to learn in the medium of
instruction, then it is not unfair discrimination.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">The Basic Education Laws Amendment
Law of 2017 proposes some far-reaching changes. The provincial Head of
Department (HOD), the MEC’s immediate subordinate, will in future
approve all governing bodies’ admissions policies.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">The HOD may direct a school to adopt more than one language of instruction,<span style="text-decoration:underline"> after taking certain prescribed factors into account, and after the prescribed procedures have been </span>followed.
Various considerations include the best interests of the child, the
interest of the community and classroom space. (Our underlining)</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">Lesufi has been champing at the
bit to get his hands on suburban schools, and get language and
admissions policy-making away from governing bodies and into his hands.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">Currently, the law does not
support an MEC who tells a school, one month before the new year starts,
that it must become a dual-medium school. </span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Body"><span lang="EN-US">The Court gave Lesufi and his subordinates a judicial tongue-lashing:</span><span lang="EN-US"></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Body"><span lang="EN-US">“The second respondent [the district
director] and perhaps the HOD and the MEC [Lesufi] acted in conflict
with the constitutional principle of legality…the 5 December decision
was unlawful and falls to be set aside on review….The action was taken
for the reason not authorised by the empowering provision and irrelevant
considerations were taken into account and relevant considerations were
not considered…there are also well known grounds of bias and irrational
conduct.”</span><span lang="EN-US"></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">The Court found the GDE’s submissions regarding the language allegations illegal.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">The GDE stated that governing bodies do not determine whether a school is full. The GDE said that</span><span lang="EN-US"> </span><span lang="EN-US">“the
school, with 21 classrooms, has a capacity of 840 learners, but
currently only accepts 621. Additional furniture and textbooks have
already been procured and an English educator will be appointed for the
pupils.”</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">But remember, Overvaal is a high
school. Will there be 55 pupils in one class? How will one English
speaking teacher be competent to teach all the subjects that the school
offers? How will the timetable work? How and by whom will it be funded?</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">The GDE often decides whether a
school is full without having regard to the difference in class sizes,
nor to health and safety concerns. Overvaal was told it could convert
its science laboratories to accommodate the additional children.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">The District Director (Director)
particularly raised the court’s ire. Directors deal directly with the
schools. Principals can attest to how impossible their lives can be
made, depending on who their Director is. In this case the judge found
her “obvious bias” regrettable. </span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">Her comments included those
mentioned earlier – that “Language could not be used to segregate
pupils”; “The school's Afrikaans-only language policy was previously
rejected by the education department”, and that “Afrikaans was a
language that symbolised ‘sorrow and tears to the majority of those (of)
whom it was not their mother tongue’”</span><span>.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">On 7 December Overvaal’s attorney
sent a letter to the GDE advising it that its instructions may be
illegal and asking the GDE to reconsider the admissions. The attorney
asked for a response by 14 December. No response was received.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">Overvaal then issued its
application to court on 20 December. It was set down to be heard on 9
January. Judgment was handed down on Monday 15 January with school due
to start on Wednesday, 17 January.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">A crushing legal defeat of the GDE
did nothing to deter Economic Freedom Front (EFF), African National
Congress (ANC) and Black First, Land First (BLF) supporters from being
at the school bright and early, and ready for a fight.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">As we know, the EFF and BLF are
unabashed anti-white racists. So, too, are some in the ANC. It is fair
to say that little about the violence that erupted was spontaneous. The
protest was designed to elicit a reaction from Afrikaans parents. Some
of the parents of the 55 threatened to burn the school down.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">Inevitably, teargas and rubber
bullets were used. But it is clear that the EFF, BLF and the ANC-aligned
Congress of South African Students were there to aggravate not
conciliate.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">Notwithstanding the court’s
judgment, critics continued to wrongly accuse Overvaal of excluding
children via its language policy.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">Steve Labona, spokesman for
Lesufi, said last Wednesday that “there is a need for English to be
taught here. It is a short-lived celebration ….we will fight it to the
last court.” He added: “The situation does not allow for the MEC to come
here.” No conciliation there, then.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">It is probably a matter of time
before Lesufi and his colleagues get the powers they want. The appalling
majority judgment of the Constitutional Court regarding the removal of
Afrikaans as a medium of instruction at the University of Free State
points the way.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">Overvaal may become a dual-medium
school in the future, but there is a lot more process to be followed
before this happens. The GDE may find that more Afrikaans-speaking
pupils will want to go to Overvaal, and they won’t be white.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">Until then Lesufi must apply the law and spend less time playing the false messiah.</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><i><span>Sara Gon is a Policy Fellow at the SA
Institute of Race Relations (IRR) – a liberal think tank that promotes
political and economic freedom</span></i><i><span></span></i></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><strong><span lang="EN-US">Sources:</span></strong></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><span lang="EN-US">The <a href="http://www.politicsweb.co.za/documents/horskool-overvaal-vs-panyaza-lesufi-the-high-court">judgment</a> in the Overvaal case;</span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><i><span>Ho</span></i><i><span lang="NL">ë</span></i><i><span lang="EN-US">rskool Overvaal saga: Judge's five most scathing quotes</span></i><span lang="EN-US">, TimesLive 16 January 2018, Sipho Mabena;</span><span></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><i><span lang="EN-US">Lesufi must be fired over handling of alleged racist incident: FF Plus </span></i><span lang="EN-US">HeraldLive, July 14, 2016, Penwell Dlamini;</span><span lang="EN-US"></span></p>
<p class="gmail-Default"><i><span>Ho</span></i><i><span lang="NL">ërskool Overvaal: Voice note goes viral as protesters gather</span></i><i><span lang="EN-US">,</span></i><span lang="EN-US"> News24,<i> 18 January 2018;</i></span><i><span></span></i></p>
<span lang="NL">Lesufi cancels Hoerskool Overvaal</span><span lang="FR">’</span><span>s visit amid protests</span><span lang="EN-US"> </span><span lang="EN-US"><em>SABC Radio </em><span lang="EN-US">17 January 2018, </span> </span>- <br><div class="gmail_signature">=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+<br><br> Harold F. Schiffman<br><br>Professor Emeritus of <br> Dravidian Linguistics and Culture <br>Dept. of South Asia Studies <br>University of Pennsylvania<br>Philadelphia, PA 19104-6305<br><br>Phone: (215) 898-7475<br>Fax: (215) 573-2138 <br><br>Email: <a href="mailto:haroldfs@gmail.com" target="_blank">haroldfs@gmail.com</a><br><a href="http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/" target="_blank">http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/</a> <br><br>-------------------------------------------------</div>
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