There are complaints about teachers from other countries, who have been hired to teach local languages, when there are teachers who are working at home without work.
This complaint was expressed by members of Parliament, who complained that teachers from other countries have been hired in some provinces, who teach subjects that are considered not to require specific skills.
The Director General of the Department of Basic Education, Mr. Mathanzima Mweli, said he found out that in some provinces, teachers from other countries are teaching native languages.
“We have had a problem that we need teachers to teach subjects such as Maths and Science. Teachers from other countries must be hired if they are going to teach these subjects and not to teach local languages. In some provinces I have visited, I have found that teachers from other countries are not teaching subjects such as Maths and Science, but are teaching subjects that do not require specific skills and experience such as languages. I agree with those who say that unemployed local teachers should be filled in these positions,” said Mweli, speaking at a committee meeting recently.
Mr. Sipheto Mkhize of the MKP party, complained that there are many teachers from other countries who do not teach subjects such as Maths and Science.
“We need to employ a lot of teachers in this country who are sitting at home because they have no job. It is not possible for people from other countries to teach subjects like this which do not require much skill, when there are people in this country who have failed,” he said.
Mweli agreed with Khize and said that this problem must be looked at in detail. Unemployed teachers are always marching to the Department of Education, especially in KwaZulu-Natal, looking for employment. The provincial department always points out the problems of insufficient budget which makes it impossible to hire teachers.
He also pointed out that there must be a lot of strengthening in looking at the payment system for government employees, Persal, as when research was done on government employees, it turned out that some of their information is not in Persal.
The Education Labor Relations Council, which deals with the issues of teachers, conducted a study that wanted to identify the ghosts of workers in education, and 438,000 were found to be working hard.
The research was conducted in 21 174 schools, for 11.7 million students. Research has revealed that there are information about 22,409 employees in Persal, which are conflicting.
Others are said to have appeared to be employed in two states. These are some of the things that need to be addressed. The Department of Education in the Western Cape, was not part of the research, which is one of the things that made MPs cry.