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NMB special school suffers due to criminals

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Dear MyPE

Yesterday, Tuesday 2 April 2019, I was joined by DA Shadow MEC for Education, Edmund van Vuuren MPL, and DA Shadow MEC for Safety and Security, Bobby Stevenson MPL, in doing an oversight inspection at the Reuben Birin Special School in Missionvale, Port Elizabeth.

Crime in Nelson Mandela Bay is totally out of control and is now depriving our children of their basic right to education.

It is an outrage that this school, which is one of the few schools in the province capable of providing a quality education to our hearing impaired community, has been consistently targeted by criminals.

Since the 25th of March this school for the hearing impaired has been burgled and set alight on several occasions. Two burglaries – in which laptops, computers and printers were stolen – have taken place.

This has now culminated over the weekend, with a brazen act of arson that has seen 12 classrooms burnt to the ground over the weekend.

We were informed that parents are afraid to send their children to the school because of the constant threat of criminality.

Provincially there are about a 1,400 children on the waiting list to be accepted into special schools, but currently we cannot protect these assets.

This school has been the target of vandals and criminals in the past and up until now the South African Police Service (SAPS) has not been able to assist.

The SAPS is undertrained, understaffed, under-resourced and underequipped and cannot address the safety of our children.

We will now take up the plight of this school and the learners by asking questions in the Eastern Cape Provincial Legislature.

A DA government will completely transform the SAPS into an honest and professional service, provide our children with a safe environment to ensure a quality education and build One South Africa for All.

Regards

Nqaba Bhanga
DA EC Premier Candidate

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Port Elizabethan

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