Dear Portfolio Committee on Basic Education,

I am writing this message after I tried on number of occasions to raise our concerns with the Dimamo circuit, Capricorn District, Limpopo Dept of Education and National Depart of Basic Education regarding recurring shortage of stationery in some of the schools in the Dimamo Circuit, more especially in the Dikgale village, as well as general shortage of textbooks in all schools in the area. In most of the cases, parents who are without understand wrongfully accuse the teachers and principals of corruption when they are asked to pay some money for buying stationery for the school.

I am a teacher myself in the neighbouring village falling under different circuit and regional office. I am surprised that some schools in the Dimamo have been experiencing shortage of stationery in the beginning of every year for the past 4-5 years. You will find that learners in grade 5-7 will be given only 4 college books and 2 note books. Every learner in some high schools are expected to bring ream of plain papers to the school otherwise will not receive progress report.

The issue of textbooks is a well-known problem in the Limpopo Province. Learners in the rural areas are suffering because they cannot share their textbooks outside school areas mainly because of what I believe most of you know that there is less trust between people in the villages. These learners have no alternative as they are residing in areas where there is no library and the are very poor to afford data bundle in order for them to surf the internet for their studies.

I am sending this email to ask for your urgent intervention and to ensure that 2020 is well planned.