Moving Lesufi back to Education a slap in the face of minorities 

31 May 2019

The decision made by Gauteng Premier, David Makhura, to move Panyaza Lesufi back to his previous portfolio as MEC for Education in the province is a slap in the face of minorities seeing as there is no doubt that he will continue his work of eradication of mother-tongue education and Afrikaans in particular.

Lesufi has not even tried to hide the fact that he has no regard for Afrikaans and that he wants to destroy Afrikaans schools. While serving as MEC, he ensured that numerous Afrikaans schools transformed to English and it is disturbing that Makhura apparently gave in to "public pressure" to restore the status quo as regards Lesufi.

Lesufi's record shows that he is not a competent MEC. He did not build enough schools even though he had the budget for it and now he will probably keep on intimidating Afrikaans schools so that they will transform to English.

The Driehoek tragedy serves as proof that he does not care about the maintenance of schools' infrastructure. His only interest in that school and the other schools that were recently inspected was to determine if the schools are full and if there is any space for additional learners who do not speak Afrikaans.

It is extremely problematic that a person, who is actually partly to blame for the tragedy, will be put back in charge of an environment where children's safety will be directly affected by his negligent behaviour.

The FF Plus undertakes to aggressively oppose Lesufi. The party will ensure that Lesufi executes his mandate on a non-discriminatory basis in accordance with the Constitution, which does in fact guarantee the protection and promotion of mother-tongue education.

The FF Plus will endeavour to unite the opposition against Lesufi and will also make sure that the opposition takes note of his shortcomings that do not deserve their support. He is hiding behind the façade of being a public figure so that people will not see his shortcomings, namely that as MEC of Education he is utterly unable to properly serve and look out for the interests of the people and learners in Gauteng.

Because the ANC governs with only a single seat in the province, the FF Plus will use the opposition numbers to oppose Lesufi as much as possible and force him to protect mother-tongue education and Afrikaans.

Makhura made a big mistake to move Lesufi back. This is characteristic of the ANC government that is unsure of its own policies, that has internal faction fights and that is struggling to find competent people in its own ranks who can be deployed in positions where they can effectively serve everyone in South Africa.

The FF Plus will put pressure on Lesufi to protect mother-tongue education and Afrikaans, to build more schools to meet the demand, to ensure that infrastructure is maintained properly and that communities are not played off against one another with education being the political football.

Issued by Anton Alberts, FF Plus MPL and caucus leader, Gauteng Legislature, 31 May 2019