After 15 years, this is my last column for The Times. I was told the media is experiencing challenges, with some retrenching workers because of media companies financial woes, from the Washington Post to our own City Press. Change happens and yes, it hurts. It was, nonetheless, my privilege and pleasure to write for you every single Thursday (I did not miss one column due) even on days when I did not need to, such as a public holiday or the end-of-year break.
Throughout, I have had excellent editors and subeditors at the Sunday Times and later @TimesLIVE even if, initially, it irritated me that some young subs believed they had a better grasp of the English language (which was possible) but then distorted the meaning of what I wanted to say.
Sometimes I cringed when I read a headline that had nothing to do with the substance of my article; it was hard to convince readers that the columnist does not choose a striking and sometimes misleading title. Such minor alarms apart, to my editors and colleagues at the newspaper, thank you for your kindness and support over the years.
From the patient Rhina Matjila, who harassed us to send invoices on time, to Fienie Grobler, who held my hand in the early years, to my editor Makhudu Sefara, a smart, decent and kind-hearted man who struggled to find the words that would put me out to pasture.
I learnt at least five things about South Africans who read my education column, especially from the days when there would be long and intense responses in the commentary section below an online version of the publication.
I would learn over the years that the column struck fear into the hearts of some political actors. A few of my education policy students would get jobs in the union buildings or a government department.
One, we care deeply about education. Maybe it is because of the Soweto Uprising that sparked a national revolt that would re-energise and rebuild activism since the Sharpeville massacre. We know the stakes are high for individuals, families and country if we get education wrong.
Two, I would learn over the years that virtually every South African knows that to change the school system we should rebuild the foundations of education and forget this obsession with the ‘matric’ (NSC) results, which only half of our children get to anyway. If a political party wanted to change its fortunes with the public, it could do so simply by mobilising public sentiment on everything from high-quality preschool education to the low passing standards to resolving the NSFAS mess.
Three, we know that government is not coming to save us. They are the problem, not the solution. Every minister has promised to eliminate pit latrine toilets, that single marker of decency and respect for children. None of them was able to do this. The flourishing of hundreds of NGOs and individual endeavour in education is a response to that vacuum of political leadership in education.
That is why on a regular basis I used the column to draw attention to individuals and non-profits as ‘the moral underground’, the South Africans (and not a few foreigners) who put their own time and money into keeping schools functional and university students afloat. Like Pastor Wesley Moodley, in a drab building in a dangerous part of the Cape Flats, advising and comforting every single NSFAS student still waiting to be paid their monthly stipend from this inefficient and corrupt monstrosity.
Four, I would learn over the years that the column struck fear into the hearts of some political actors. Some of my students would get jobs in the Union Buildings or a government department. More than one of them would tell me about a nervousness on a Thursday morning because an official or a policy would be lambasted in the weekly column. There would be cursing, debates and sometimes threats. One minister of education informed me directly that sometimes it was important to calm down some of “the comrades” who wanted to do more than write a vitriolic response. When such stories reached my ears, I felt that as an academic columnist, I was doing my job.
Five, it was always clear to me that the majority of South Africans want the best for this country. It is easy to be distracted by angry, aggressive and violent mobs, like Operation Dudula or others who show up in army fatigues at schools like Addington Primary in Durban to deny immigrant children the right to education. Never confuse the part for the whole, the minority for the majority, the noise for contemplative, determined citizens who believe in the constitutional ideals of our great country.
I will miss writing for you. The column was a way for me to ‘get things off my chest’, so to speak, but also to remind fellow citizens that we are better than our past and that through thinking and action we must continue the struggle for our ideals, ensuring that every child has access to a quality education whether in grade 1 of primary school or the final year of undergraduate studies. I still know of no other force than education that can transform the lives of millions and change the world.
Goodbye.
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