“Honourable Chairperson,
The ruling party will today vote to pass the BELA Bill. They will say BELA Bill is going to transform education, but it is a dead man walking.
The BELA Bill died when the DBE took 10 years to develop it. It died when the vast majority South Africans making submissions rejected your Bill and you didn’t tell us that. This Bill died when you ignored public comment and failed to present the views of the public to the committee in a matrix or any comprehensive document.
You will tell your supporters they will now get into any school they choose. This will not happen.
The BELA Bill will be struck down in the courts because you failed to follow the simplest procedures and act transparently.
Your voters will discover too late that this is a broken promise like your broken promises of ’94 and ’99.
This Bill died when you decided to make it an Abortion bill. The teachers’ unions will discover too late that you have made them nurses and their trust has been abused as you abused it in 2004 and 2009.
This Bill will be the first step to nationalise our ECD sector. It will open the door for money to be quickly sent to your friends. This government’s plans show billions will go to organised labour and gogos will go without jobs. Tenderpreneurs will build classrooms at schools you control and independent ECDs will fall into ruin. Your friends will get fat, the people will starve.
You will steal the hope of the ECDs like you stole hope in 2014 and 2019. You are a dying party pushing a dead Bill.
But I say… Let the dead bury their dead.
For Christians, ‘7’ is a number of hope and renewal – the period of Jubilee. We have had six parliaments of broken promises, broken trust, and lost hope. We, as the ACDP, proclaim a Jubilee for education. And while you bury your dead, we will work with and for the living.”
