The Cost of Discrimination: Peter Mputle

Iranian Baha'is are denied access to higher education. Not A Crime's The Cost of Discrimination video series tells the stories of another country — South Africa, which barred "non-whites" from educational opportunities equal to those for "whites" during apartheid — to connect that history to the current persecution of the Baha'is in Iran.

At school, Mputle received Bantu education. This was the term used for second class education given to non-white people. “Our education was to create slaves for the white people," he says. "People who could not create jobs for themselves. The reason we were taught Afrikaans was for the white bosses to be able to communicate with the blacks.”

Mputle originally studied in the Tswana language, but in the middle of his schooling the taught language changed to English, making his studies far more challenging. He wanted to be an accountant but he was not allowed to take the necessary subjects to be a professional in the field. Instead, he took history and agriculture, which led to a career in teaching. “The purpose of the regime was to limit our subject choice, to limit our life choices," he says. Many of his teachers had only completed up to Grade 8 education, taken a crash course in teaching and returned to teach the younger years. The quality of teaching in the "non-white" schools was substandard.

But he made it to university. On arrival he was told he did not have the relevant subjects for accounting and that the course for his second choice, law, was full. He never intended to become a teacher, but in the end, this was the only option available to him.

“To draw water and to collect wood was what the devisers of apartheid wanted to create from the Bantu system," Mputle says. "Now, South Africa is a country lacking in skills and there is high unemployment amongst young people.”

Read more about The Cost of Discrimination video series.