NORTH WEST EDUCATION TO CLAMP DOWN ON ILLEGAL SCHOOLS

The North West Department of Education is sending a strong message to the community about schools operating illegally in the province.

These are unregistered private or independent schools that are aimed at derailing the future of our learner’s and have a negative effect on their academic records and to a great extent contributing to learner drop out.

MEC for Education in the North West Province, Mmaphefo Matsemela makes a clarion call to the community to report unregistered schools that always lure unsuspecting parents to costly fees with no value.

“I make this call to the North West community to come forward and report these schools because Chapter 46 (1) of the South African Schools Act 84 of 1996 provides that “No person shall establish and maintain an independent school unless it is registered with the Head of Department”

The Act also states that:
_”any person who contravenes this is guilty of an offence, and upon conviction shall be liable to a fine or imprisonment for a period of up to 3 months”_.

“These schools are disruptive to our educational system since we end up not being able to trace a learner’s progression due to lack of proper record keeping.

These illegal schools must closeshop now and for good, otherwise in January 2022, just after the reopenning of the school calendar, the Department acting jointly with SAPS will embark on a full blown campaign to identify and ultimately use the law to close these illegal schools which hit hard on the vulnerable learners and unsuspecting parents, and arrests will be made in law enforcement”, said Matsemela.

Matsemela further states that, an unregistered school often would have bogus teachers who do not carry SACE certificates and these ills undermine the quality of the education system in the country.

The South African Schools Act, says we must put the interests of the learner as “paramount” above everything else and as the learners’ rights to quality education are enshrined in the Constitution of the Republic

For more information please contact:
Elias Malindi
Department Spokesperson
072 892 8399/ 072 115 4855