Cape Town - The Western Cape has topped the list of corporal punishment by teachers with 85 cases, followed by the Free State with 53 and Gauteng with 35, according to the South African Council of Educators (Sace).
Sace recorded a third of all misconduct cases involving corporal punishment and assault on pupils in the financial year ending March.
Sace’s 2021-22 annual report recently tabled in Parliament showed that the Eastern Cape recorded 19 cases, both KwaZulu-Natal and Limpopo provinces recorded 17, North West 11, Mpumalanga eight and Northern Cape three.
The South African Schools Act outlawed the administering of corporal punishment at schools to pupils 26 years ago.
The law, as it stands, makes anyone who contravenes it guilty of an offence and liable on conviction to a sentence which could be imposed for assault.
In its report, Sace said it received a total of 764 cases of misconduct against teachers during the year under review, up from 430 cases recorded in 2020- 2021.
In 2019-20, the council received a total of 550 complaints.
The council noted that from April to June 2021, it received a total of 256 new complaints - 86 of them were of assault on pupils, 64 were for sexual misconduct and eight were for assault of colleagues by colleagues.
“It is worrying that corporal punishment of learners still takes centre stage and seems to still lead the pack,” reads the report.
Corporal punishment has been among the top three misconduct cases over the past three years.
The report also states that between July and September 2021, the council received a total of 105 new complaints with the highest form of misconduct registered against teachers being assault of pupils, followed by sexual abuse, and assault of colleagues.
In the period October and December 2021, 233 new complaints were received - 40 sexual abuse cases reported, followed by 29 assaults on pupils, and 11 assaults on teachers, educators reported.
Between January to March 2022, a total of 170 new complaints were received with the highest form of misconduct registered against teachers being assault on pupils, followed by sexual abuse, and assault of colleagues.
On Monday, parties and teacher trade unions expressed shock at corporal punishment and assault by teachers 26 years after it was banned at schools.
Sadtu national spokesperson Nomusa Cembi said: “We are concerned that corporal punishment is continuing when it was outlawed quite some years ago.”
Cembi said they noted the increase in the use of violence not only on pupils but on teachers as well.
“The matter needs to be looked at not only at (the) level of school but violence as a societal problem,” she said, adding that psycho-social support should be looked into by the department.
Naptosa executive director Basil Manuel said corporal punishment may show a marginal increase because parents were becoming more aware of the channels to report such cases.
Manuel also said there was now better reporting of the cases over the years.
“It is worrisome, but we must look at the positive side of it. These people have been reported.”
Manuel appealed to teachers to refrain from administering corporal punishment.
“Corporal punishment has been outlawed for years,” he said, adding that while some parents don’t have a problem with corporal punishment administered on their children, teachers stood alone when charged.
ACDP MP Marie Sukers, a member of the portfolio committee on basic education, said education in the country was in a crisis.
Sukers said when the department and Sace make a presentation to the committee, they would want to understand the common denominator in the cases involving corporal punishment and assault.
“We will want to know if the department has done proper investigations and what elements to the issues are there,” she said.
According to the report, the council conducted and finalised 253 investigations on new cases and 147 on old cases.
CEO Mapula Ella Makgalane said the council continued to be faced with a disjuncture between the financial and human resources available to investigate and prosecute cases of ethical misconduct and the increasing number of cases received annually. “This result is an inevitable cumulative number of cases rolled over from one financial year to the next,” Makgalane said.
Council chairperson Mabutho Cele said they had experienced a slow turnaround processes in the finalisation of the teacher misconduct cases.
“Consequently, this results in recurring rolled over cases into the new financial year and delaying of justice,” he said.
Cape Times