The provincial chairperson of SACECD, Sebongile Radebe-Phori, says even though they have received the reply to the memorandum on time, the reply still gives no solution to their grievances. Radebe-Phori had previously said during the handover of the memorandum that if they are not happy with the reply – another protest will follow for the department to hear them out. She currently says members of the national democratic body for early childhood development (ECD) have requested a mass meeting to take place as soon as possible to come up with solutions to the department’s reply.

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One of their grievances on the memorandum included the R1751 stipend ECD employees have been receiving for their services. Radebe-Phori says the department’s reply to that grievance is that there is nothing they (the department) can do about the stipend. She has suggested that it will have to come to a point where parents of the children they take care of must pay for the preschool/crèche for the caretakers to earn a decent salary. “The stipend that the employees receive is not enough to care for a family in this economy, and most of the employees are their families’ breadwinners,” she had said previously at the handover of the memorandum.

As much as they acknowledge the assistance they have received with the academic curriculum from the department of education since they were moved from the Department of Social Development, most of their problems still remain unsolved.

She says she does not want to speculate what the outcome of the meeting with other members will be. They could try to reason with the department once again or plead with parents to pay for their children’s placement in preschools. The memorandum was accepted by the director in the office of the MEC, Jonas Ramokgwase, who stated some of the grievances that were outlined in the memorandum were already on the department’s agenda to give attention to. Ramokgwase, responsible for stakeholder engagements, added that on the department’s agenda is also the discussion of a peaceful and productive transition of the ECDs to the Department of Education from the Department of Social Development.

An inquiry was sent to Education for comment on the issue at hand.

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