Initiation schools have become death traps

It’s disrespectful that foreign nationals are opening schools, writes

of Acornhoek.

Godfrey Malibe

Iwas raised in a culturally and traditionally obliged background in the area of Bushbuckridge in the Mpumalanga province. The mountain or initiation school is considered one of the most respected practices on our calendar. This applies to both boys and girls, but it is mostly for boys.

If you didn’t go there as a boy you’re considered a half-man and the pressure becomes too much for you to bear, although your right not to go there is still respected. The belief is that circumcision is the passage to manhood and womanhood.

Lately, initiation schools have become death traps.

The winter is approaching and it is that time again of initiation schools. That makes me doubt if it is right to send our kids to the mountain school for circumcision anymore.

Some parents have lost their children there. Some of the boys have now lost function of their manhood or are permanently crippled. I learnt with regret that there are foreign nationals who are taking chances by opening their own initiation schools here in our beloved South Africa.

This is shocking and disrepectful. The initiation school is sacred and must be respected. It used to be opened by Chiefs, not by every Tom, Dick and Harry. No wonder our kids are dying.

The law governing the practice of operating initiation schools has been strengthened but still we see many deaths.

I think something drastic needs to be done about this.