Belpaire applauded the inclusion of needs of these groups saying that, "having no idea what the teacher is saying, is not conducive to improved learning outcomes". He also proposed for an increment of the number of teachers who speak the 'ethnic minority' language. Belpaire hoped that this measure would be put in place one day. The EU assisted financially towards the development of this policy. However, the policy itself does not dwell much on the issue of mother tongue or 'ethnic language', especially at lower primary level.
In an interview with deputy permanent secretary, support services in the education and skills development ministry, Kgopotso Ramoroka, The Monitor learnt that the government has no intentions of teaching in mother tongue at lower primary level.Rather, they have realigned the breakthrough programme to give teachers efficacy in teaching pupils from predominantly non-Setswana speaking communities. "We have not started offering it in the mother tongue, what has been done is that those teachers who could not teach breakthrough well among non- Setswana speaking communities have been re-skilled to achieve that," he said.
