An announcement by Northern Cape School Athletics that this weekend’s zone meets have been cancelled sent shock waves through the province’s parent communities.
This serves as more evidence that public education should be disentangled from trade unions with ties to the ANC government.
The annual athletics programme entails that schools’ own athletic meets are followed by zone, regional, provincial and national events. Trade unions are, however, trying to punish the Northern Cape Department of Education for failing to fulfil financial obligations. So, they implemented a “Work to Rule” practice. Consequently, educators do no more than what is expected of them in terms of the relevant rules. Sport coaching, therefore, falls through the cracks.
In many schools, sport is one of the most important items on the annual programme. Young athletes train year-round, even during the December holidays, to perform as well as they possibly can.
Through this, trade unions are not only doing an injustice to these learners, but also to the schools that continuously incur costs to offer sports coaching at an almost professional level. Sport’s educational value makes it more than a luxury that can easily be sacrificed.
Even if an agreement with the Department is ultimately reached, the time has already been lost and cannot be recovered without serious disruptions. The trade unions, apparently, do not care.
The Bela Act, for which norms and standards for implementation are currently being prepared, already takes education out of the hands of parents and the school community, to a much greater degree than before. Against this backdrop, the cancellation of athletic events serves as a timely warning that government and trade unions should not be trusted with education any longer.
Trade unions should take the law of unintended consequences into account. Their conduct could result in youth athletic meets no longer being organised by schools, but that clubs or other organisations will take over. This could be an important step in disentangling education from the state.
