Why Parktown Boys High principal had to walk
Department misplaced trip request - arbitrator
Under public pressure to hold someone accountable for grade 8 Enoch Mpianzi’s death, the Gauteng education department acted unfairly and undermined its procedures when it fired Parktown Boys High School principal Malcom Williams.
These are the findings of Education Labour Relations Council which ordered that Williams be reinstated to his job this week.
Williams was initially found guilty of undertaking a school excursion without prior approval and failing to ensure a correct rollcall was maintained for all pupils at the camp where Mpianzi died.
He was dismissed on December 8 after the death of Mpianzi on January 15 during a school orientation camp to the Nyati Bush and River Break in Brits, North West. Mpianzi and other boys were on the Crocodile River in a makeshift raft, which overturned hours after they arrived at the camp.
His death sparked public outcry and backlash on the school on its handling safety of pupils at such camps.
An investigation into Mpianzi’s death by Harris, Nupen and Molebatsi (HNM) Attorneys
led to Williams being charged on three counts of misconduct – two of which were upheld after the disciplinary proceedings.
But arbitrator Mark Hawyes in his analysis of evidence and argument at Labour Relations Council said the submission of the HNM report was not reliable as Mira Briel employed by HNM attorneys was not privy to the actual happenings relating to allegations levelled against Williams, rendering her testimony to largely hearsay.
For this, Hawyes said the findings in the report were based on incomplete facts and without a proper appreciation of the legislative framework within which the matter falls.
“It is common cause the department never applied its mind to the school application to go on the excursion and the blame must be laid on their door as it had tasked an intern from a completely different government department with the responsibility of taking the application to the director’s office but who instead kept it in her drawer,” Hawyes wrote in the arbitration award.
The arbitrator said Williams gave an unchallenged testimony that the department had a history of only approving application for tours after they had occurred, which was confirmed by Shirley Molobi, director at Johannesburg east district offices, who said that when she took over she had to create a new system.
“Williams could not reasonably have been expected to have been involved in the early morning school rollcall prior to learners proceeding to Nyati and he had not seen the list and was at no time at the camp in possession of the list,” Hawyes said.
The ruling added that Williams could not be held accountable for the death of Mpianzi and it was clear that MEC Panyaza Lesufi was “immersed in the case by his involvement with the family and utterances in the press.”
“The MEC’s hearing of the principal’s appeal was certainly procedurally unfair,” Hawyes wrote.
Williams told the arbitration that he had appointed a Mr Meintjies, the head of grade 8 as the tour manager for the excursion to Nyati as he has 7-8 years experience as an educator and had attended 6-7 grade 8 camps as support staff and was the camp leader at the 2019 grade 8 camp.
Meintjies applied for permission to hold the camp on November 12 2019 and the application was hand delivered to the district office seven days later but by the time of going to the camp they had not received a response.
The application for permission apparently did not reach the district director’s office because it was lying in an intern’s desk drawer.
The intern who received the document was on a temporary assignment from another government department.
Molobi said two immediate managers in the relevant department where the application was handed were later disciplined for their part in the intern’s omission and were given the sanction of three months suspension.
Lesufi said they would look for advice from the experts with a view to finding a lasting resolution to the matter.