Saturday, 21 December 2024: - The South African Communist Party (SACP) welcomes the proclamation for the full implementation of the Basic Education Laws Amendment Act, also known as the BELA Act, by President Cyril Ramaphosa. Equally important, the SACP will oppose any regulations by the Minister of Basic Education that may have the effect of either watering down the full implementation of the Act or preserving discriminatory practices based on school language or admission policies and thus defeating the purpose of the Act. No school in our country must be reserved for one or another particular racial group based on any ground. Apartheid practices in education as everywhere must be obliterated in their entirety. Every school in our country must be a non-racial and non-sexist centre of learning for all South Africans regardless of language and admission policies.
Passed by the previous National Assembly with an overwhelming majority of 223 votes against a paltry 78 as a Bill, the BELA Act essentially seeks to strengthen governance in schools by tightening certain sections of the South African Schools Act of 1996, to address the challenges against access to and the provision, governance and administration of basic education, and to continue with the transformation of our education system to ensure social justice, social cohesion and success. The DA was part of the tiny minority of right-wing parties that opposed the Bill and continued to oppose the Act.
The SACP reiterates its stance that no school in South Africa must be exclusively reserved for a certain race through school language or admission policy. In line with the Freedom Charter’s aspirations for equal education, the BELA Act is an important step towards ensuring that schools are schools for all, under an education system based on non-racialism and non-sexism. It builds upon the 30 years to ensure that all children have equal access to quality education – from their early years and throughout their schooling, as the President stated.
In line with the programme of the SACP as espoused in its recent 5th Special National Congress, the SACP will continue to campaign for and defend progressive laws such as the BELA Act, including the National Health Insurance Act, and those which align with the SACP’s positions on critical transformation imperatives.
The SACP will further campaign to counter efforts aimed at blocking the full implementation of the BELA Act, particularly the drive by the racists who opposed the implementation of clauses 4 and 5 of the BELA Act in what they referred to as “Afrikaans schools”. These clauses, now carrying the President’s instruction for their full implementation, are critical to end the practices of school governing bodies that uphold the apartheid legacy of discrimination and exclusion. Such backward practices deprive African learners of access to these schools through exclusionary admission and language policies, which act as barriers rather than enablers of access.
Issued by the South African Communist Party,
Founded in 1921 as the Communist Party of South Africa.
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