“It’s not that we don’t want to improve our situation, it’s just that there are no opportunities.” An exasperated Clayton Pieterse, 19, from Bonteheuwel sits sullenly across the table, his sister Candice, 25, at his side.
The two work at a popular retailer at its V&A Waterfront branch. Clayton is a seasonal worker whose contract ended on Friday.
“I was unemployed for seven months before I got this job. I really want to study, but the course I want to do needs me to improve my maths and science marks.” He pulls out his matric certificate. His maths and science scores are poor – it doesn’t bode well for a teen who wants to study physiotherapy.
“They look at his marks and they reject him,” says Candice. “But they don’t see that on the day that exam was written, they (gangsters) were shooting and he came running back home one his way to school.
“I asked him ‘aren’t you writing today?’ and he said they were shooting.”
Clayton interjects: “I was walking and these two guys on the field told me ‘it’s not safe now’, and I turned around and ran.” “As soon as he told me why he was back home,” says Candice, “the gunshots started.”
Once the gun fire had subsided, Clayton ran to school to write his maths exam. “How can he be expected to perform well when you’re living like that?” Candice pleads.
Clayton matriculated in 2014, and said he was one of 10 pupils in matric at Bonteheuwel High. The Grade 8 classes have up to 80 pupils, he said.
“But they tell you,” says Candice, “when you start high school, ‘out of the 600-odd of you Grade 8s, only a handful will make it to matric. I wonder who among you it’s going to be’.”
Gangsterism has long been a problem in Bonteheuwel, which Clayton says is cut off from the rest of the city due to its layout and public transport routes.
“We only have Vangate Mall, and that only came up a few years ago,” he says. “And they don’t even have a Sars office,” says Candice. “There’s just no services there. You have to travel far just to get your business done and your affairs in order, let alone find a job.”
“It’s up to parents to raise their children properly,” Clayton says, “so that they don’t become gangsters. But we’re very lucky to have parents that raised us right. But I still feel this pain.”
Clayton tells of how, while sitting in a bus en route to work one day, he felt a pain across his chest “like something was bursting out of me”.
“He sometimes cries at night,” says his sister, wiping away her own tears.
Stellenbosch University runs a programme called SciMathUS which takes recently matriculated pupils who have had poor marks in maths and science and mentors them rigorously so they are well-prepared to rewrite for a better result.
“I know if I can get onto that programme, I can improve. I want to study to be a physiotherapist. I want to work in a government hospital and help people. That’s where I’m needed.”
Clayton shows the Cape Argus an SMS that reads: “We regret to inform you that you have not been accepted onto the programme as we can only accommodate 100 people at a time.”
“That was the second time I was rejected.” He convinced his father to drive him to Stellenbosch to plead with the administrators in person.
“I asked him to take the day off. I was already rejected, but I didn’t tell him. I still don’t know how I’m going to tell my dad. But he took me, and I saw the lady and I asked please, please, please. I explained my situation. That I come from a disadvantaged background and my marks are like that because they were shooting that day.”
His other results attest to his dedication to his schoolwork, achieving a bachelors pass with marks in the 60s and 70s.
But the two results in subjects required to enter university in the course he wants to follow, he scored 22 percent.
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