Dear Minister Angie Motshekga,
First, thank you for your response to my Daily Maverick Opinionista. When I saw your response, I was thrilled and exhilarated – my little opinion piece was read by the minister and you took time to respond.
However, that initial thrill was rapidly replaced by a sense of deep sadness.
For at least a decade, 80% of our children have been unable to read for meaning. Where was even the smallest acknowledgement of this tragedy from you? This should have been at the heart of your response.
Instead, you gave a tutored response, one that was profoundly defensive, and which failed miserably in placing our children at the centre of your thinking (see my many previous attempts pleading for such a stance).
First up, perhaps I did not explain my use of the concept of ruins well enough. You argue that the concept of “ruins” implies there must have been something great preceding the current state. That is definitely not my interpretation.
I think the truth is that ruins can equally refer to the end of something appalling. Colonial rule in Africa was in ruins in the 1950s and 1960s. Apartheid was certainly in ruins in the early 1990s, and there was nothing great about that racist abomination.
But lurking behind your criticism of my use of the term ‘ruins’, lies, I would suggest, an attempt to try to silence me. Worse still, you accuse Dr Mamphela Ramphele and Prof Jonathan Jansen of harking back to the “glory days” of pre-1994. Seriously?
I have not read everything written by Dr Ramphele and Prof Jansen – although I have read a great deal of it. I contend (unless you can show me the evidence to the contrary) that there is nothing they have ever said or written that “harks back to the glory days of pre-1994”.
Sadly, when you insult Dr Ramphele and Prof Jansen, you do yourself a disservice. Character assassination never looks good. Even on a politician.
As for me, I am white, male, a professor, utterly privileged, and without question, I benefitted a great deal from apartheid. This makes it even more difficult for me to rebut your proposition that I am somehow harking back to the “glory days of pre-1994”. But I do. And I accuse you of devious obfuscation in trying to write me off as some kind of apartheid apologist.
If my figures about only 14% of children starting school in Grade 1 completing Grade 12 with a Bachelor’s pass is incorrect, I apologise. But interestingly, your response is somewhat vague. A two-thirds increase may sound impressive.
But, of course, it really does depend on the denominator. I am interested in how many children who start Grade 1 in South Africa go on to achieve a Bachelor’s pass. Not the percentage who start writing Grade 12. If the figure of 14% I provided is wrong, please provide me with the correct one.
Your article includes a statement about manufacturing outrage. I do not need to manufacture outrage. Surely you must have noticed that our country is drowning in it.
In just the last week, we have the manufactured outrage of Minister Khumbudzo Ntshavheni accusing the private sector of trying to engineer the collapse of the ruling party, and President Cyril Ramaphosa (in true Orwellian form) requesting journalists that they be more like the Chinese and speak about the good things the government is doing.
I am afraid that in terms of manufacturing outrage, folk devils and panic, your party could be a case study in any revised edition of Folk Devils and Moral Panics.
And the lack of solutions? Odd that I have to say this, but that is your job.
You are the Minister of Basic Education. That is the job of your administration. It’s not my job. But instead of criticising my grammar (my use of non-sequiturs), perhaps you could have risen above mere defensiveness and asked for a genuinely open conversation.
There are many who are happy to help.
Believe it or not, my aim is not to trash or criticise simply for the sake of it. It is a plaintive cry to awaken you from your slumber. And you are most definitely in a slumber.
Over and above the catastrophe of our children being unable to read for meaning, the imminent reality is that in the next decade, most of the jobs we are currently schooling our children for are going to be replaced by artificial intelligence.
This is quite simply an emergency.
Could we not simply acknowledge the emergency, sort through the ruins, and imagine and build something radical and new?
In this spirit, in the spirit of hoping for something new, I propose a public debate with you. I am sure Daily Maverick would gladly provide the platform.
I wait to hear from you, Minister Motshekga. DM