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The Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Basic Education today continued its discussion of the Basic Education Laws Amendment Bill (also known as the Bela Bill). According to AfriForum, there is still no indication that the objections about especially clause 5 and 6 of the bill, which deal with governing bodies’ right to make the final decision on their school’s language and admission policies, are seriously being taken into account.

According to Alana Bailey, AfriForum’s Head of Cultural Affairs, members of the committee and spokespersons of the Department for Basic Education claim that there is no agenda against Afrikaans and that governing bodies will be able to appeal to the provincial heads of education if they are not satisfied with decisions about language and admissions policies. Even though processes for the approval of these policies may be revised, the government will still have the final say about the policies – unlike the current situation where the authority rests in the hands of school governing bodies comprising community members.

“There have already been too many statements by officials and politicians about the undesirability of monolingual Afrikaans schools and the department’s intention to transform these schools into parallel or dual medium institutions. These reassurances cannot be taken seriously,” says Bailey. She refers to statements by Dr Reginah Mhaule, Deputy Minister of Basic Education, a week ago that learners cannot be turned away by schools based on language, as a recent example in this regard.

“The continued existence of monolingual education institutions is the cornerstone of mother-language education in any language and is especially essential when a smaller language like Afrikaans comes up against a major language like English. Eventually, the stronger language displaces the smaller one, a scenario that we have seen play out in many schools and universities in the past decade.”

“These articles in the Bela Bill are a calculated attack against any institution that wants to provide mother-language education sustainably, unless it is English mother-language education. Based on this, AfriForum continues preparing for legal action against it, unless the articles are scrapped in total and the current status quo is maintained,” she says.

Issued by AfriForum