A directive from Swaziland’s Ministry of Education
that corporal punishment is now banned in schools seems to have gone largely
unnoticed.
Phineas Magagula, Minister of Education and Training, warned that
teachers who beat pupils should be reported to the ministry so that they could
be disciplined, according to a report in the Times of Swaziland.
The directive was issued without fanfare and few teachers appear to know
it has been made.
Swaziland has a long history of atrocities committed by teachers against
their pupils in the name of ‘discipline’. Although there were rules about how corporal punishment
could be administered, these were largely ignored.
As recently as September 2015, the Times reported a 17-year-old school pupil died
after allegedly being beaten at school. The pupil reportedly had a seizure.
In March 2015, a primary school teacher at the Florence Christian
Academy was charged with causing grievous bodily harm after
allegedly giving 200 strokes of the cane to a 12-year-old pupil on her buttocks
and all over her body.
In February 2015, the headteacher of Mayiwane High School Anderson Mkhonta reportedly admitted giving 15 strokes to a form 1 pupil for not wearing
a neck tie properly.
In April 2015, parents reportedly complained to the Ndlalane
Primary School after a teacher beat pupils for not following his instruction
and shaving their hair.
In October 2014, 20 pupils were thrashed before
they sat an examination because they had been absent from school studying for
the exam the previous day.
On Thursday (15 October 2015), the Swazi
Observer, a newspaper in effect owned by King Mswati III and the voice of
the traditionalists in Swaziland published an article against the abolition of
corporal punishment.
Observer
journalist Fanyana
Mabuza wrote that if corporal punishment was abolished, ‘[T]he
future could be bleak, especially for the children who for their own good need
a bit of spanking to bring them to order.’
The article in the Observer, a
newspaper that believes Swaziland will be a ‘First World’ nation by 2022 added,
‘We just do not see the future clearly without the cane in our schools.’
See also
SWAZI SCHOOL ‘TORTURES’ STUDENTS
CHILDREN CHAINED AND FLOGGED BARE
PROBE VICIOUS SCHOOL BEATINGS
SCHOOL FLOGGINGS OUT OF CONTROL
SCHOOL HEAD PUBLICLY FLOGS ADULTS
http://swazimedia.blogspot.com/2011/02/school-head-publicly-flogs-adults.html
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