South Africans need to start talking and stop the torching
The recent torching of schools in Limpopo demonstrates the need to talk more rather than resort to violence during confrontations.
Photo: ANA.
It is hard to differentiate the mindlessness of torching two more schools in Limpopo with a threat by the previously and almost anonymous South African Further Education and Training Student Association (Safetsa) to launch a complete shutdown of 265 campuses under the umbrella of the country’s 50 technical and vocational education and training colleges.
Safetsa, which claims to support and stand in solidarity with the #FeesMustFall campaign, espouses a less incendiary approach than the wantonly mindless arson in the troubled village of Tshitale. And it is a moronic fait accompli that will doubtlessly have long-term effects on the futures of affected pupils – already locked into the socioeconomic handcuffs of this country’s rural educational failings.
And while the equally obscure Yonke Twani, president of Safetsa, launched a plea to leave the infrastructure on the targeted campuses unscathed during their national action to have the department of higher education and training address a long list of grievances, the organisation seems to have ignored very recent history: confrontation ignites the threat of escalating violence and discussion must be the preferred rallying point.
In this, we must all start talking, for as Martin Luther King observed: “We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.”
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