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Another of those unbelievable stories emerged this week when a security guard at a Soweto school was arrested for allegedly molesting 83 pupils.
Just last month, we read with disbelief about how two Northern Cape teachers were arrested for allegedly impregnating 30 of their pupils – although it later transpired that 16 girls had fallen pregnant over a three-year period at the school. Still, it was shocking to discover that teachers see their girl pupils as potential girlfriends.
The alleged molestation of the Grade R pupils in Soweto has seen the principal and management team of the school being removed from their posts while counselling for the pupils was organised. It has also left the country with lots more questions than answers.
While the scholar patroller has since been arrested and detained in custody until next week, the effect of his alleged crimes on the victims will live with them for the rest of their lives.
It is shocking that our children suffer abuse at the hands of those we trust to teach and protect them. South Africa’s spiralling crime rate, and along with it the molestation of pupils, the impregnating of young girls by their teachers and the recent violence we have seen on social media – where teachers inflict corporal punishment and pupils retaliate by attacking teachers – all mirror the society that we are.
Year after year, crime statistics show that we are a nation that teaches our children that only violence can solve problems and that shows youths the “value” of achieving success through corrupt means rather than hard work. And so normalised has woman abuse become that even our partners, wives, nieces, sisters and grandmothers are not safe under the same roof as their male relatives.
The violent crime in gang-infested areas is spilling over into the school environment as some pupils join gangs for protection, while others bring guns and knives to school to defend themselves.
This week, the basic education department told Parliament that more than a million pupils had experienced violence in the form of bullying‚ corporal punishment or assault. This will only fuel more violence.
It is time we focused on what we do in our homes and what we teach our children, through our actions, about the environment we want them to thrive in. Once we agree that we want what’s good for them, we should work to ensure that we teach them respect, care and love, and that violence is not the answer to everything.
We also need to be active in our community, at our schools and in all the areas in which our children socialise to reinforce what we teach them at home.
Until then, we will continue fighting a never-ending battle against abuse, while asking why things are the way they are in our schools and communities.
