Over the past few months videos have emerged on social media platforms of teachers violently assaulting learners in the classrooms. These videos started emerging from schools in KwaZulu Natal, however recently a video emerged of a teacher assaulting a student in the Gauteng province.
Corporal punishment was banned in South Africa in 1997. The Abolition of Corporal punishment Act, 1997 (Act No.33 of 1997) is an act of the parliament of South Africa that abolished judicial corporal punishment. Twenty years after the Act was put to effect, teachers are stull practicing corporal punishment. This, therefore, in South Africa is an illegal act.
Moreover, the manner in which teachers practice corporal punishment seems more like physical abuse then a form of punishment. One of the videos that emerged showed a principal of a school in Umlazi, south of Durban assaulting a learner with a cane.
In this video the learner is heard crying and pleading with the teacher who continues to hit the child. This is just one case, with all of being them almost similar.
The Department of Education did suspend this principal and has apparently reported suspension of other teachers who commit that same crime. This has however not sent a strong enough message to other teachers as these videos of assault continue to emerge.
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