Even as we are still reeling from the appalling 2011 matric results in the Eastern Cape, we heard this week that pupils from certain high schools are going home early because their teachers are on a go-slow strike.
Someone in the newsroom mockingly asked how one would know the difference between a go-slow and the normal work rate.
Even as we are still reeling from the appalling 2011 matric results in the Eastern Cape, we heard this week that pupils from certain high schools are going home early because their teachers are on a go-slow strike.
Someone in the newsroom mockingly asked how one would know the difference between a go-slow and the normal work rate.
We are not sure whether this go-slow strike is actually a local interpretation of the teachers’ union statement that its members were going to work-to-rule. In fact these two forms of labour action are diametrically opposed. If the union members were to heed their leaders call to work-to-rule they would have to accelerate their work rate significantly.
The South African Democratic Teachers Union, (Sadtu) has been sabotaging the education of our youth because its members feel they have been unfairly treated by the Eastern Cape Education Department. They say that by retrenching temporary teachers, permanent teachers now have to work 35 hours per week.
In response to the apparent deadlock, the Education Department announced that it has appointed more than 1 500 of 2 103 temporary teachers in substantive posts. While the announcement will certainly bring some relief to the embattled education system, it is not clear how permanent these appointments really are. It appears that it could be an interim measure used by the department to buy time.
The Education Department has now threatened to dock pay checks of those who are participating in the go-slow strike. This is yet another potential catastrophe because the department has still not repaid teachers who were penalised last year even though they did not take part in the Sadtu strike.
While both Sadtu and the Education Department exchange accusations about how they are treating pupils like cannon fodder in their power struggle – there is no dispute that the pupils are getting an inferior education. Young people in schools dominated by Sadtu are already falling behind the other schools and we are still only in the first month of the year.
Why are parents and school governing bodies allowing a power hungry union and an incompetent Education Department to mess with the future of their children?
