Date: 02/03/2007

Source: Free Sate Provincial Government

Title: Tsopo: Acceptance of Touch of Peace

Free State Education MEC M Tsopo during the Acceptance of Torch of Peace, Free State


Programme Director, Mr Motsetse
MEC Archie Lucas
Heads of department
Senior Managers from both provinces
Esteemed guests
Teachers
Parents
Learners
Members of the media present

It is a great pleasure and honour to be here today, to accept on behalf of the Free State Department of Education and the Provincial Government the Torch of Peace in reinforcement of the noble intention of Safety in Schools. We are gathered here today because of our belief that the increasing levels of drug and alcohol abuse, gangsterism and the carrying of dangerous weapons in our schools and within their communities, puts even more pressure on all of us to pull our resources together to end the kind of problems facing us.

The Torch of Peace we are receiving from the Northern Cape Department of Education today will burn throughout the year and is a symbol of our endless efforts to bring about safety in our schools which will ultimately lead to an environment conducive for effective learning and teaching. The torch reflects our wish as Free Stators and proud South Africans for our children to learn in safe schools where there is peace and stability throughout the year. As individuals, as workers, as communities and society we need to make our voices heard and our actions must demonstrate the will for safety in our schools, our workplaces as educators and in our communities.

As education stakeholders and role players, we have adopted a zero tolerance position against attacks and harassment of our dedicated educators and committed learners within school campuses in different parts of our province and countrywide. We share the responsibility of keeping all our learners, especially the girl children and female teachers safe, but we cannot do it alone. We will engage our law enforcement agencies to continue to do what they know they have to do to save innocent learners and educators from further assaults and humiliation by monsters who invade our schools.

We will collaborate with our law enforcement agencies to ensure that the perpetrators are brought to book. It is a sad reality that countless learners are subjected to assault, abuse and harassment in their own schools. Our schools are being turned into centres where drug trafficking is a daily routine. Our schools are being turned into battle grounds by some of our own learners involved in gangsterism, learners who carry dangerous weapons such as illegal guns and knives. The victims are our own children and educators. Often the perpetrators are neighbours, schoolmates or brothers to some of our learners, who should love them and protect them. Instead, they subject them to humiliation and suffering. As the Free State Department of Education and part of Government, we cannot tolerate such acts in our schools. We are therefore, compelled to look at the question of safety in our schools. What can be done to prevent such criminal activities in our schools? It is not just a matter for the education authorities, the police and the courts. It involves all stakeholders and role-players in education.

We must start where we are and we must start with ourselves. We need to change our attitudes. We need to educate others and together we can reverse the culture of gangsterism and indulgences in drugs and alcohol which is so prevalent in some of our schools today. Let us make our schools places of learning and teaching, because they were meant just for that. Let all of us involved in education, educate our communities to change and develop a different perception of what and how schools should be like. People who sell drugs to our learners, people who use our learners as drugs traffickers within our schools, learners who are involved in gangsterism and carry weapons to school should be exposed to allow the law to take its course against such individuals.

Such individuals should be isolated, rather than having their behaviour condoned, and they should meet social condemnation. We need the support of all stakeholders and role-players to commit themselves to support the stance of the Department of Education and Government on safety in schools. We need to create an environment which will enable all our learners and educators to experience an assurance that they are safe in all schools. We need to assure them that they will not be victims of harassment and humiliation at the hands of some elements within our schools; elements that have turned themselves into loose cannons and want to rule our schools for their own selfish interests. As the Free State Department of Education, we have identified some of the schools where there is high prevalence of drug and alcohol abuse, gangsterism and carrying of weapons to schools. We need your support as stakeholders in education to further identify more such areas, for us to be able to combat this malady in our schools.

Before I conclude, I wish to point out to the learners of St Bernard Secondary that the surely the people of Mangaung and Motheo District in general, must be proud of themselves because your school has been identified as the school in which the Torch of Peace will be burning on behalf of the District. We believe that as the Torch of Peace will be burning in your school, followed by other schools in other districts in the province, it will bring the light of safety in your own school and community; and it will further bring light to all other schools in the Free State province and the country at large. As we accept this Torch of Peace we are saying as the Free State Government:

* no to drug and alcohol abuse amongst our learners in all our schools
* no to gangsterism in our schools
* no to dangerous and illegal weapons in our schools and their surroundings.

Lawlessness and aggression have no place in our schools and in our society in general. We need to foster a spirit of co-responsibility, respect for each other and tolerance – for safe schools, for effective learning and teaching.

I thank you.

Issued by: Department of Education, Free State Provincial Government
2 March 2006