MEC, acting education acting head to appear in court over failure to heed order
The provincial education department is scrambling to meet the terms of a 2010 court order to provide proper school facilities for a dilapidated “special needs” Makhanda school after the high court ordered the department’s top brass to come and explain its failure to do so.
The Makhanda high court ordered education MEC Fundile Gade and his acting head of department Mahlubandile Qwase to appear in court in person at the end of May to explain why the department failed to heed an August 2010 court order to build a new school for Amasango which remains housed in disused and decrepit railway buildings.
Twelve years ago, the high court gave the department just two months to develop and implement a plan to build Amasango new school facilities.
Amasango caters for socially marginalised, impoverished and abused children in Makhanda and is registered by the education department as a “special school” or a school that provides an education for pupils with “special education needs”.
The department placed the school on a priority list of planned school construction projects in 2006 and a site was identified for the new school.
But, nothing happened, prompting the school, assisted by the Legal Resources Centre, to resort to court.
The department claimed at the time that it did not have the financial resources.
This was disputed in evidence provided by the government watchdog organisation the Public Service Accountability Monitor which showed the department had radically underspent its infrastructure budget between 2007 and 2009.
Faced with this evidence, the department at the time caved in and agreed to a court order against it.
But, once again, not much happened. The department provided some temporary prefabricated classrooms while it claimed to be looking for a more permanent solution.
Amasango school governing body chair Mzwandile Mayalo said in an affidavit that despite numerous requests over 12 years, the department had failed to heed the order to develop a plan in consultation with the school for adequate school facilities for it.
He sets out pages of evidence of the school and the LRC’S attempts over 12 years to get the department to heed the order.
The high court has now again ordered the department to immediately set about implementing the order and to regularly report to the court on its progress.
Education spokesperson Malibongwe Mtima confirmed the matter was being attended to.
“We have received the court order and are engaged in meetings with infrastructure and legal services along with the LRC.”
He said the department could not comment further other than to say the matter was receiving its attention.