Author: Sue Maclennan

Parents, teachers and education officials will meet at a Makhanda high school early on Tuesday 13 April in a bid to restore calm after a spate of fainting episodes among Grade 12s. Spurred by panicked speculation on social media, the incidents disrupted two school days at the school and the town’s broader education community is concerned about the potential for further disturbances during a crucial period in the academic calendar. During the morning of Friday 9 April, several learners in one of the Grade 12 classes at Ntsika Secondary School collapsed on the floor, in what witnesses said looked like…

Mother seeks closure after son’s death “I saw my son lying there. There were so many cars parked around there – maybe if they took him to hospital as soon as it happened he would be alive. “But they didn’t. They were just watching.” Siphamandla Mdilitwana died at Cool Spot tavern in Joza on the night of Friday 12 March 2021. He was just 26. “My child was so sweet,” his mother said. “You never heard from neighbours, or his fellow students, about anything that he ever did wrong to anyone. “Where was God when that happened?” Siphamandla’s mother is…

Fourteen people were apprehended in Makhanda Thursday 9 April for not complying with the Disaster Management Act. South African Police Spokesperson Captain Khaya Tonjeni said this was during the course of anti -crime operations to enforce the Disaster Management Act in Makhanda’s CBD, suburbs and townships. Dangerous weapons were confiscated “Police began early today with roadblocks at key town entry points,” Tonjeni said. “Tonight, members deployed from local stations, neighbouring districts and Provincial personnel are busy conducting vehicle stop and searches, enforcement of compliance  to alcohol trade regulations,  drug dealing and public disorder just to name a few. Fourteen people…

Residents of eNkanini in Makhanda barricaded the east end of Trollope Street with rocks and burning tyres on Thursday 8 April. They did this in frustration following a three-year bid to have power infrastructure put into the informal settlement. But Makana says while there has been progress, the timing and nature of the final installation is in the hands of Eskom. “How many years have we toyi-toyied for these lights?” exclaimed one resident at an outdoor  community meeting at eNkanini. “They promised us 120 lights in January but nothing happened. Those were just empty promises.” A team from Eskom visited…

A team putting up palisade fencing to protect electrical infrastructure in the Dundas Street municipal parking area came across a large cache of bullets and cartridges during their digging last weekend. The construction was ordered and paid for by a local businessperson after copper thieves vandalised a municipal electrical installation, leaving shops in the area without power for a period. Holding up one of the bullets, team member Vuyisile Teyi said, “I was digging a hole for one of the support poles over there in the corner and next thing I started finding these.” Teyi called his co-workers over to…

What does a teacher do when the textbook doesn’t cover what it’s supposed to? She simply writes a new one. Graeme College Maths and Accounting teacher Morgan White has written no fewer than 18 textbooks in the past three years. “It started off in 2018, when I was photocopying accounting notes I’d made for my class,” White said. There was limited content on accounting for Grade 8 and 9 – leaving an enormous gap in these fundamentals that reared its head in Grade 10. “It’s only in Grade 10 that Accounting is taught as a proper subject – but we…

Police poured bottles of liquor on to the tar in a crackdown on public drinking and noise in Makhanda last Friday night 26 March. A crowd partied on the pavement outside a New Street venue and with the music coming from the outdoor speakers so loud that residents 5km away could hear it clearly, neighbourhood WhatsApp groups were abuzz with outrage. Police arrived around 10pm to confiscate bottles from people who were drinking in the street and emptied them out on to the street. Also on Friday 26 March, in Alice, 56 people, including several University of Fort Hare students,…

Judges rule Roger Walsh’s removal from Fort England was unfair and slam EC Department of Health for threatening constitutional governance. Ousted CEO of Fort England Hospital Roger Walsh must be reinstated in that position retrospectively from 20 October 2018 according to a Labour Appeal Court judgment handed down on Tuesday 30 March. The judgment follows the Department of Health’s removal of Walsh from Fort England amid conflict at the institution, and then from the public service altogether. Walsh has engaged with the Labour Court over the past three years on both matters. The judges said Walsh’s removal was not in…

Mayor Mzukisi Mpahlwa has assured residents in the Scotts Farm and Albany Road areas that they will get their community hall back soon. This comes as the Recreation Hall in Albany Road has remained occupied by homeless people for close to a year. The venue can normally seat around 500 people (fewer under Covid protocols and under normal circumstances is regularly used for everything from funerals to dance classes. The facility was identified as a lockdown shelter for homeless people in April 2020, at the start of the Covid-19  lockdown. Officials from the Department of Social Development found that of…

On the eve of a planned shutdown of university campuses across the country, Rhodes University has urged the Department of Higher Education to find a sustainable way to fund deserving students. The Rhodes SRC on Friday 12 March put a halt to its O-Week programme and gave the University until 10am on Monday 15 March to respond to a list of demands regarding registration fees, student aid allowances, laptops and data. Late on Sunday 14 March, the SRC posted on its page a call by the Rhodes University SRC, EFFSC and SASCO for the student body to convene outside the Drostdy…