It's back to apartheid as kids are fenced off in South Africa

Times LIVE - 15 August 2010

A school in the Cape Wine-lands has refused to merge with an Afrikaans school in a clash over race and culture that has split over into parliament. Tomorrow, 66 pupils and teachers of Nondzame Primary School will move into new classrooms built on the grounds of Pniel Primary School. But, in a scene reminiscent of the apartheid era, a wire fence will separate the schools - one for Afrikaans-speaking colored pupils and the other for Xhosa-speaking children. And as lessons get under way, the woman who started Nondzame Primary in 1983 - suspended principal Nomalady May - will face a disciplinary hearing for refusing to let her pupils be incorporated into the Afrikaans school.

May and parents say the merger will destroy the culture and identity of the Xhosa-speaking children. Nondzame Primary had to relocate after its lease on a property owned by Boschendal Wine Estate expired in June. Parents said they would rather send their children to the Eastern Cape to be educated in Xhosa than be absorbed into a colored school in what they believed was a "racist" area. May complained about the move to parliament's select committee on education, which met her, the governing body and education officials last week.

John Lyners, district director-general for the Western Cape Department of Education, said neither the department nor Stellenbosch municipality had vacant land available to build a new school. May, whose disciplinary hearing is scheduled for tomorrow, declined to comment. Parents from Pniel Primary are disappointed. "We actually thought it would be nice to have Nondzame at the school. Our children could learn to speak Xhosa and learn about other cultures. Now it's going to be just like apartheid - they will have to communicate through a fence," said Henry Cyster, a former Pniel Primary governing body member.

Despite the fence, pupils will share ablution facilities.

 

This is an example of institutional racism.

 

Let's hope those old ways does not creep back in the culture.