Tana Malinga

Every child deserves to walk into a school feeling safe, protected and free to dream. That belief is once again at the heart of Gauteng’s growing school-safety drive, as authorities intensify efforts to remove drugs, dangerous weapons and other prohibited items from learning environments.

On Wednesday, 9 September 2026, Gauteng MEC for Education, Sport, Arts, Culture and Recreation Lebogang Maile joined a major SAPS-led search and seizure operation in Daveyton, where a significant law-enforcement deployment descended on schools as part of a wider provincial crackdown on crime, substance abuse, gangsterism and dangerous weapons.
The message is becoming increasingly clear: Gauteng will not surrender its schools to crime.
The operation swept through Phandimfundo Secondary School, Lekamoso Secondary School, Rivoni Secondary School and Hulwazi Secondary School, with learners and classrooms searched, alongside areas surrounding the schools.

At Phandimfundo and Lekamoso, officials recovered 31 prohibited items, including vapes, dagga, cigarettes, scissors, matches and containers of suspected drugs.
At Rivoni Secondary School, the discovery was even more alarming, a bullet concealed inside the arm strap worn by a learner, together with vapes, an Okapi knife and other prohibited items.
For parents, educators and communities, such discoveries are deeply concerning. But they also reinforce why sustained intervention matters.
“It’s a routine for us on Wednesdays to join these searches unannounced throughout the province, but these searches happen regularly,” Maile said, stressing that simultaneous operations are taking place because the challenge is too widespread to be confronted through isolated interventions.

The operation involved SAPS, the Ekurhuleni Metro Police Department (EMPD), Gauteng Traffic Wardens and Gauteng Community Patrollers, alongside other security partners.
Importantly, the crackdown is not simply about searching learners. It is about protecting the future of Gauteng’s children.
Maile linked the interventions to the department’s “It Takes a Village to Raise a Child” programme, emphasising that school safety cannot be left to teachers and government alone.
“Parents, communities, educators, law enforcement agencies and government must work together to protect learners and ensure that schools remain safe environments for teaching and learning,” he said.
That collective spirit deserves to be welcomed.

To every educator working under difficult circumstances, every parent worried about a child’s safety, every community member standing against drugs and gangsterism, and every learner choosing education over crime , your efforts matter.
The hope is that these operations will not remain concentrated in selected hotspots, but will continue reaching every corner of Gauteng, every township, suburb, rural community and school.
Because every classroom deserves peace.
Every teacher deserves to teach without fear.

Every parent deserves confidence that their child is safe at school.
And, most importantly, every learner deserves the opportunity to dream, believe and build a better future.
More regular, intelligence-led and unannounced operations across all Gauteng schools can help turn that hope into reality.
A safer school is not merely a safer building. It is a stronger foundation for the Gauteng we want to build.