All caring citizens must share Fred Khumalo's distress regarding the shocking statistics that black children's education remains backward, despite 15 years of democracy.
Can we continue blaming apartheid as the source of this crisis?
Unfortunately, those who think like US President Barack Obama, or Johannes Tselapedi, North West's education MEC, see things differently.
On his recent visit to Ghana, Obama expressed his belief that Africans - South Africans included - are more to be "blamed for what happened in the last decade".
For instance, our government's budget and planning since 1994 should have included rolling out, among other things, libraries in disadvantaged communities - a point echoed by Tselapedi.
It should also have incorporated community- education campaigns to avoid rioters venting their anger by torching public properties, such as libraries and schools.
Some might argue that the government tried to make the schooling environment workable, for example, by installing electricity or computers in every classroom since 1994.
However, few or none of the classes now have cables due to theft.
But Tselapedi is under fire for "describing the government's commitment to improving the public education system as 'unrealistic'," citing limited budget allocations.
Since 1994, the department has been receiving a fair bulk of the national budget and little has been visibly done, which emphasises Obama's point of lack of budget planning and monitoring - a twin evil facing our education's future.
