EFF leader commander in chief Julius Malema has called for the provision of laptops and tablets for all university and high school students to help them keep up with with education during the lockdown.
In his Freedom Day message which he delivered virtually on Monday afternoon, Malema said the lockdown which has shut down schooling in the country should not disadvantage the students.
“Institutions of higher education should not leave any student behind, and this is the time institutions of higher learning should be consolidating resources, aligning systems and teaching from a centralized system where possible.
“We demand that government must work with content developers to ensure that all these laptops, tables and computers are pre-loaded with learning material. It cannot be that, only the children of the rich and mostly whites continue to learn,” he said.
Juju said there must not be a learner or a student anywhere in South Africa without a laptop and tablet that does not have internet and called on all network providers who had committed to installing internet in schools when they applied for licenses with ICASA.
“All educational content in South Africa now and forever must be zero-rates in terms of data costs.
“Like we said with healthcare equipments, we should build internal capacity to produce electronic devices and gadgets that will assist with teaching and learning.
“We must find new ways of facilitating learning and teaching, and now is the time to go to all these companies and demand that they play a far much direct and practical role,” he said.
Malema said the pandemic has vindicated his party’s position for the call of gadgets for students and called on the government to deliver.
The red beret leader also called for reliable network infrastructure particularly in the rural areas and for the public broadcaster to provide educational programs on both television and radio during the lockdown.
Malema welcomed the housing of homeless people in shelters by the government during the lockdown and proposed that the destitute should be rehabilitated and and integrated back into the society.
“South Africa let us be amongst some of the few countries in the world to abolish homelessness. The homeless people currently housed by government should be rehabilitated, and integrated back into normal society. What we will not appreciate is to take homeless people back to the streets immediately after the containment of coronavirus.
He also welcomed the increase of social and the introduction of special grant for unemployed people, saying the increases must be permanent.
“We want to caution the current government that if you want peace in this country, you should keep the basic income grants for all our people who do not have jobs and are not employed and it must be increased,” he said.
He added that these interventions would play a significant role in boosting local economic activities and in the reduction of poverty for our people.
“The child support grant must not be reduced but must be increased and left at R800 per month. The basic income grant must not be reversed and must instead be increased to R1000 per month.
“Our demand in this regard is simple, these increases must be made permanent. The OLD AGE grant must never be reduced and must instead be increased to R2800 per month,” he said
