This weekend the public participation process for the Basic Education Laws Amendments (BELA) Bill continues with hearings in Gauteng and the DA encourages all educators, parents, and stakeholders to attend en masse to raise their objections and concerns.
The DA has a number of concerns with the Bill, particularly the so-called ‘Lesufi-clauses’ which seeks to disempower schools and school governing bodies (SGBs) from determining their admission and language policies, and could be used to target mother tongue education.
We will be keeping a close eye on the proceedings to ensure this round of hearings go off without a hitch.
There has been a number of attempts by the ANC to capture the hearings and skew the perception of public support for the Bill. Should the BELA Bill be bulldozed through Parliament, the same chaos that recently allowed KwaZulu-Natal learners to starve, will infect all provinces.
The DA will do everything in our power to oppose the BELA Bill.