With the abolishment of corporal punishment, parents are prophesying doom for their Children who are going to cause chaos and mayhem in schools as the law has made them untouchable.
Speaking during public hearings on the Education Amendment Bill at Mabutweni Hall, a Bulawayo resident who identified herself as Ms Ndebele said:
Corporal punishment is necessary because as it is we are struggling to deal with these youngsters.
Imagine when they know that teachers cannot do anything to them, it will be chaotic. Teachers must be allowed to spank them but not use fists. It must be reasonable.
Another Bulawayo resident, Xolani Ndlovu called on the government to provide free education. He said:
From ECD to A level, education must be state funded. As it is, it’s parents who are constructing schools, they are forced to buy buses, construct perimeter walls and new blocks for ECDs which must be done by Government on top of the fees they would have paid.
Following the deployment of non-Ndebele speaking teachers at the city’s primary schools, Nokuthaba Ndlovu from Makokoba in Bulawayo said:
We have a lot of teachers who are coming from other regions being enrolled at the colleges when our children here are being left out.
This has resulted in non-Ndebele teachers dominating in our schools and this is killing our language, that issue must be resolved.
The Education Amendment Bill was approved by the Cabinet in February and it was gazetted in the same month.