Motshekga: 204 Learners Test Positive For COVID-19 at Eastern Cape Boarding School

NYAKALLO TEFU

BASIC Education Minister Angie Motshekga is racing to control the coronavirus outbreak at schools in the Eastern Cape after 204 learners and hostel assistants tested positive at Makaula Secondary School in KwaBhaca, providing government with the biggest challenge since the reopening of schools in early June.

While Motshekga is fanning out over the boarding school premises and hostels and visiting surrounding neighbourhoods to question residents on whether they’ve been in contact with anyone who’s visited the school, the South African Democratic Teachers Union has called on the Department of Education to shut down all schools in the Eastern Cape as a precautionary measure.

“We call upon our Eastern Cape department of education to close the schools with immediate effect until the department is ready, as life matters to most of us,” the teachers’ union wrote in the letter signed by its provincial secretary, Chris Mdingi.

“There are perpetual