Panyaza Lesufi, the MEC for Gauteng Education, has criticised the continued interruptions to scholar transportation in Sedibeng in the wake of an incident in which a Grade 11 boy student from Meyerton High School lost his life after being accidently run over by a scholar bus.
According to information available to the department, the event happened Tuesday morning at 7:05 AM as students boarded the department’s scholar transport bus for the trip to school.
According to reports, the bus struck the boy as he attempted to board it.
Due to the tragic incident, MEC Lesufi stated that the department has been made aware of the disruptions to student transportation in Sedibeng that started on Wednesday.
It is said that at De Deur, Meyerton and Sharpeville, Rusoord and Panfontein, student buses are not permitted to transport students.
Lesufi went on to say that other reports claim that some neighbourhood members were intimidating drivers and stoning buses instead of transporting students.
“We offer the family of the learner who passed away in this horrific situation our sincere condolences.
We also deplore the ongoing disruptions to Sedibeng’s student transportation system, which have a detrimental effect on our students’ ability to learn.
We ask community members to support our students’ use of student transportation, according to MEC Lesufi.
Lesufi claimed that on Wednesday, the department’s Psycho-Social Team was sent to the school and gave trauma counselling to everyone who had been impacted by the tragedy.
To ascertain the circumstances surrounding the occurrence, the department stated that investigations are in progress.