Court battle over future of Cape Flats school
EDUCATION lobby group the Concerned Education Forum (CEF) and the provincial education department are locked in a court battle over the future of a Cape Flats high school.
The forum has accused the Western Cape Education Department (WCED) of immoral educational injustices and of ignoring a high court judgment to address infrastructure needs at Uitsig High School.
The school, which has been described as a “war zone” due to its dilapidated state, saw learners’ parents issued with letters from the department to enrol their children elsewhere as “it’s no longer safe for them at the school”.
But the WCED stands accused of deliberately allowing the school to deteriorate in order to close it down.
CEF member Lionel Adriaan said the court ordered the WCED in March last year to ensure that water, electricity and proper sanitation services were provided at the school, as well as two 24-hour security guards, but this was not done.
Instead, the department has taken the matter back to the courts. The department
was due back in court yesterday, but the matter was postponed to March 28 because the judge recused himself, Adriaan said.
“These ‘unsafe’ conditions referred to were created by the WCED through deliberate neglect and the lack of interest to improve the lot of township residents. The ‘unsafe’ conditions are being used to support their reasons for learners not to remain at the school,” he said.
“Immoral educational injustices are still perpetrated against marginalised citizens.”
A school governing body member, Roseline Smith, said: “The school is nearly 50-years old. There are 89 kids in the school and the department didn’t want us to take on any more.”
Education MEC Debbie Schafer’s spokesperson, Jessica Shelver, said vandalism, dwindling learner numbers and the cost of repairs were the reasons for the school’s closure.