According to a Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS), South Africa has the world’s worst performing education system. Prospects for improvement are uncertain. The claim that education for most black pupils was better under apartheid than it is now is no longer made only by organisations such as the South African Institute of Race Relations (SAIRR). Professor Mamphele Ramphele, a former vice-chancellor of the University of Cape Town, and Wendy Luhabe, the chancellor of the University of Johannesburg, also now take that view.
A study published by JET education services estimated that nearly 80% of public schools are dysfunctional. In many schools, no proper teaching and learning is taking place. This exacts a heavy toll. Social and economic development cannot take off in the absence of education. Despite the current economic down-turn, the need for skilled labourers and professionals will remain strong over the years to come. The absence of a skilled work force is repeatedly identified as a major stumbling block for sustainable, economic growth.
The country’s largest teachers’ union, the South African Democratic Teachers Union (Sadtu), with 235 000 members, is indifferent to the problems in the education system. Rather than contributing to improving the school system, the union is actively undermining education by subjecting it to the political agenda of its leaders and intervening in the power squabbles that have crippled the ruling African National Congress (ANC).
On the eve of the recent hearing in the High Court in Pietermaritzburg, Kwa-Zulu Natal, in connection with the trial of the ANC president, Jacob Zuma, the local branch of Sadtu mobilised its members to come out in support of Zuma. Union representatives said that school exams that fell on the same day had to be cancelled or other personnel of the department of education should invigilate, as teachers were not available in schools. Sadly, sacrificing the noble aims of education to party politics and union interests is not the misplaced activism of a local union branch but seems to be standard Sadtu practice.
During the violent public service sector strike that took place last year, Sipho Nkosi, the Sadtu secretary for Kwa-Zulu Natal, said: ‘Together, we have shut down public schools, hospitals, and clinics. Up until Friday we closed down 97% of former model-C schools in the province. By Tuesday, we will have dealt with the other 3% and then we will move on to private institutions and places of higher learning.’ In other words, escalating, all-out strike action, no matter the consequences, is the usual tactic of the union. In Khutsong, in the North West province, between 700 and 800 teachers were holding to ransom some 13 000 to 14 000 pupils who had their teaching and learning interrupted for months by political disagreements. While these events took place in 2007, an end to this sort of school disruption is still not in sight. In August 2008, Sadtu called for ‘political strike action’ in support of Zuma.
As these examples show, the organised representatives of many teachers do not take teaching seriously. Union practice makes it clear that the union serves a political purpose first. Unless a government takes over that is dedicated to impress upon Sadtu that proper teaching is at least as important as political squabbles and strike action, South African education will remain mediocre, and many pupils will receive sub-par education, with little prospect for improving their social and economic conditions. A presidency which owes its ascendancy to such ‘political strike action’ does not augur well for remedying this sad state of affairs.
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