Today's Labour News

IOL News reports that less than a day after President Cyril Ramaphosa announced his Government of National Unity (GNU) cabinet, the ANC-aligned SA Democratic Teachers’ Union (Sadtu) expressed unhappiness over the appointment of the Democratic Alliance’s (DA’s) Siviwe Gwarube as the new Basic Education Minister.

Sadtu general secretary, Dr Mugwena Maluleke, said Gwarube’s appointment to lead the basic education department was problematic, was an affront and had made the union upset. “We really are not happy, I must indicate, with the department being headed by a person from the DA, irrespective of whether black, white, or brown that is not an issue. The issue is that those (people) believe in the ideology that the DA still has, that the poor and the working class must always accept the inferior status and this white supremacy mentality has governed the DA throughout and we have seen it even in the letters that have been leaked, the statements by Helen Zille – obviously that is their culture, their belief, their ideology and that is the issue,” said Maluleke. He went on to say that Sadtu feared that Gwarube would attempt to repeal the Basic Education Law Amendment (Bela) Bill which was passed by the National Assembly and awaits Ramaphosa’s signature. The Bela Bill was vehemently opposed by the DA. “We know that she (Gwarube) is going to attempt to repeal, to reverse that because the DA did not support it. The president has not signed it, and we wonder why the president has not signed it because the president signed a number of Bills just before the elections, and only left this one out. It leaves us with a question mark on why this one (Bill) was particularly left out,” Maluleke stated.

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Jonisayi Maromo at IOL News
• Read too, Sadtu against appointment of DA's Gwarube as basic education minister, at EWN

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