Congress of South African Students marched on the Pretoria Department of Basic Education's premises, showing solidarity with parents who were denied report cards due to unpaid fees and lost textbooks.
COSAS Spokesperson Douglas Ngobeni says more than 80% of the schools in South Africa are not free but even section 25 of the South African Schools Act Sub 13 says that there is no school that is supposed or is allowed to withhold a report card of any learner for whatever reason.
This was amongst many issues that the student organisation was marching against.
The student organisation is also in discussion about the curriculum review and the issue of language policing with the department of basic education.
“We met with the senior executive for senior management of the department of basic education. Some of the things which have been raised to the department of basic education are issues that are going to be addressed as soon as January,” said Ngobeni.
The student organisation has received more than a thousand complaints from parents saying that schools are denying issuing them with their children's reports due to unpaid school fees, unreturned textbooks, and textbooks that are in a bad condition when returned to the schools.
COSAS urges that parents should put an end to them committing to things that they cannot keep up with because those agreements end up affecting their children.
