With just over a week to go until Basic Education Minister, Angie Motshekga publishes the final version of the Minimum Norms and Standards for School Infrastructure document, Cameron McConnachie of the Legal Resources Centre in Grahamstown is positive about its potential.
With just over a week to go until Basic Education Minister, Angie Motshekga publishes the final version of the Minimum Norms and Standards for School Infrastructure document, Cameron McConnachie of the Legal Resources Centre in Grahamstown is positive about its potential.
"Binding norms and standards will help provinces to have better plans," McConnachie told Grocott's Mail after his tour with a high-profile delegation to Eastern Cape schools.
Organised by non-profit organisation Equal Education the tour, led by Archbishop Thabo Makgoba, a former Bishop of Grahamstown, was to raise awareness about school infrastructure.
The Legal Resources Centre (LRC) regularly represents Equal Education in litigation to have binding norms and standards adopted.
“The aim of the tour was to shed light on the infrastructure problems of schools in the Eastern Cape,” said McConnachie. “This is a build-up to the release of the final regulations for Minimum Norms and Standards for School Infrastructure on 15 May.”
The draft regulations, released in January this year, were “vague, lacked the technical detail, and did not include any time-frames which would bind the Minister,” said McConnachie. “As the draft stands, it doesn’t assist schools,” he said.
By way of example, McConnachie referred to a visit to two mud schools in the same area. One is receiving an R18 million upgrade from the Department of Education, while there are no plans to replace or upgrade the other.
The tour, dubbed ‘The Eastern Cape Solidarity Visit’, hopes to put pressure on the Minister to adopt more specific and binding regulations on 15 May, which all provinces have to abide by and report on to the Minister.
“Binding norms and standards will help provinces to have better plans,” McConnachie said.
The delegation was appalled to find a Grade One classroom accommodating 163 children at the Putuma Junior Secondary School in Mqanduli, McConnachie said. Only one of the school’s eight classrooms had fewer than 100 children in it.
McConnachie said Putuma was currently represented by the LRC, as were all of the schools visited on the tour. The schools are either seeking more classrooms, better toilets, or to be recorded as a mud school so that they will receive better infrastructure.
The Solidarity Visit concluded on Friday 26 April with an Evening of Reflection at the Book Lounge in Roeland Street, Cape Town. Zakes Mda, Sindiwe Mangona and Njabulo Ndebele spoke about their experiences, thoughts and impressions of the visit.
“I am always encouraged by the strength of civil society in South Africa," Mda said. "I believe civil society will save this country. With young people like this, how can you be devastated about South Africa?"
Established in 2008, Equal Education is a movement of pupils, parents, teachers and community members working for quality and equality in South African education, through analysis and activism.
