Cape Town - Attempted extortion by minibus taxi associations is putting children’s safety and education at risk, the Western Cape Education Department (WCED) has warned, as Academia Primary School in Mfuleni reported a 90% absenteeism rate on Monday morning due to the issue.
Speaking to the Cape Times on behalf of affected parents and pupils last week, Nontsikelelo Manqamane said their children’s bus driver was allegedly intimidated when he was completing his route along Mfuleni and Brentwood Park the week prior.
Taxi drivers had allegedly told him that he was not allowed to drive the children and ordered him to offload the children and not complete his trip.
Since then, children have been unable to attend school, as parents could not afford alternative transport.
Education MEC David Maynier visited the school on Monday and said the school reported an absenteeism rate of 90%.
“Minibus taxi association members have been threatening and harassing our contracted drivers to prevent them from transporting learners.
“This is an attempt to muscle in on transport contracts and to extort money from the Western Cape Education Department.
“The blockade affected up to 2 400 learners last week, depriving them of their constitutional right to education, and we await feedback from our schools as to the number of learners affected today.
“This includes our special needs learners, where a driver was forced to turn back as he feared for his safety and took learners home.
“Minibus taxi associations are demonstrating that in order to line their own pockets, they are willing to compromise the matric exams and compromise teaching and learning in our schools, sacrificing the best interest of our children,” Maynier said.
Maynier said the department would not be intimidated by the bullying tactics from the taxi industry.
“Let us be clear: the Western Cape Education Department will not meet with any minibus taxi association until they terminate their blockade and teaching and learning resumes without disruption.
“They have now allegedly issued a threat to ‘offload’ learners from any transport not operated by minibus taxi association members, posing a serious threat to our children’s safety. This allegedly includes parents driving their children to school because their usual transport is not operating.”
Maynier said he would meet with Provincial Police Commissioner, Lieutenant-General Thembisile Patekile, to discuss what SAPS will be doing to stop the attempted extortion and intimidation by the taxi industry and to ensure learners’ safe return to school.
Last week, general secretary of Codeta, Nceba Enge, told the Cape Times that in March last year, they were to meet with the WCED, where they were “looking at getting an opportunity to transport children to various schools in the Western Cape”.
He said: “We were promised by the deputy chief that a follow-up meeting will be convened after engaging other stake-holders. We have waited ever since then up until today, and nothing happened.
This is a developing story.
Cape Times