IFP wants teacher training colleges re-opened

Johannesburg - Government must consider re-opening teacher training colleges which were closed in the mid-90s, the KwaZulu-Natal IFP said on Monday.

"We believe that the closure of these colleges is a major contributor to the teacher crisis that we are facing," IFP MPL Thembeni kaMadlopha-Mthethwa said in a statement.

"These colleges were established during the time when the IFP was in control of KZN and the present government was short-sighted in closing them down."

Former education minister Kader Asmal was behind the decision to close down the colleges.

President Jacob Zuma said in Richards Bay in 2008 that the decision was wrong.

"Asmal is a man who believes he knows everything. What he did was worse than what the apartheid regime did to our education system," said Zuma, who was the ANC president at the time.

Asmal resigned from Parliament that year because he did not want to vote for the disbanding of the Scorpions. He died in 2011.

KaMadlopha-Mthethwa said the colleges had to be re-opened urgently to replace ageing teachers who would be lost to the system in the next five to 10 years.

"Although universities are working to push up the number of teaching graduates, this is not enough to meet the shortage," she said.

"The short supply of trained professionals will only be addressed once the department has reopened those colleges and established new colleges in rural areas."