Frik Landman @fjlandman - Twitter Profile

Did you know about 102 years ago there were no public or government Afrikaans schools in SA? The gov of the day refused to establish such schools and Afrikaans children in public academical facilities were ridiculed and forced to wear signs hanging from their necks labeling them donkeys. The Afrikaner, however decided that their children will have an Afrikaans education whether the state liked it or not. Thus they turned to their homes and started the first Afrikaans school at a house. 3 Teachers were employed by the group of parents -all three did not study in Afrikaans, since there were no Afrikaans education available at the time and Afrikaans were not even recognized as a language yet (that only happened 2 years later). Naturally there were also no resources in Afrikaans such as textbooks. These 3 teachers took it upon themselves to develop the non language Afrikaans, as it was in that time, academically and so they created and developed terminology and technical subject jargon in Afrikaans that they could use to teach their pupils. This was done in a very hostile environment and without any state funding or resources. In a house with only 3 determined teachers, a few hands full of pupils and parents who decided they do not need the government, one of the richest academical languages began to grow and as a result delivered some of the greatest minds of our time. Please note that this was not a time of abundance for the Afrikaner. There were an extreme amount of orphans after the war, debt especially due to taxes and farms left without any livestock or seeds to plant and burnt down. Unemployment was almost the norm. It was a time of extreme poverty. The Afrikaner’s solution: education because that is the only way out of poverty. Those who could not find a house or other building were they could be taught, went to “school” underneath a tree. You can research the “Help Mekaar” movement where koeksisters were baked and sold along with almost everything one owned (given as donations) to generate funds for the Afrikaner community to pay certain debts etc. To the state were stupid barbarians and substandard humans. Looking at this history and circumstances, I cannot comprehend why, in 30 years, with all the funds and resources at their disposal, the ANC-government did not develop all official languages in SA to that extent. I cannot understand why more schools weren’t built and why the education system has been plunged into a crisis where more futures are being ruined than are being built. If a poor minority community who were actively oppressed at the time can achieve this, then surely majorities whose leaders have been voted into government and were ruling for 30 years (and is still in the presidential seat and running most departments and provincial governments) can achieve what the Afrikaners did and more?

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