The parents of Mkhumbane Secondary School, in Chesterville, were overjoyed after the High Court of Pietermaritzburg ruled in their favor regarding the cameras installed in the school’s classrooms.
This dispute, which started in late January this year, finally reached the court on Monday, and it finally ruled that he should not be released.
There was noise in this school, and learning was disrupted for three weeks last month, when Sadtu teachers abandoned teaching, demanding that the cameras be removed from the classrooms.
According to Mr. Babalo Majola, who is in the governing body of the school, he said that they were helped by Natu, to take this issue to court.
“We took the issue to court with the help of Natu, after receiving a letter from the Ministry of Education, saying that we should remove the cameras as soon as possible. Then we got a date in court after making a request that the matter be heard urgently,” said Majola.
He said they were happy with what the court decided.
“The judge left the Ministry unaware of the issue of the cameras, and decided that he should not be released. We are happy because this is what we wanted and the parents are also very happy because they have been fighting for him not to be released,” he said.
He said that since the talk of removing the noise of the cameras, they have been standing on the ground that they were not removed because they are useful to the students and teachers in this school, which is said to have a problem of being invaded by criminals on a daily basis.
He said they have no idea what will happen to the number of Sadtu teachers who abandon teaching. Those teachers swore and asserted that they will not return to teach if the cameras are not removed.
“We don’t know what they will do now that the court has decided that the cameras cannot be removed,” he said. He accused them that if they were not happy with the cameras installed in the classrooms, they should have talked to their union and intervened, not leaving the students in the dark.
He said what he got from the parents who are still fed up, is that they don’t even want to change their mind and say they are coming back. he said that since they abandoned teaching, those teachers found part-time workers who were paid by them, and they continued.
“What we want is for the Department to intervene in the full employment of those teachers who are currently working,” he said.
In this school, the principal, Mr. Ntokozo Ngobese, was appointed for three months. Although the Ministry insisted that he was charged with misbehavior at work, which is about refusing to bring back a teacher who was unfairly dismissed from this school, the parents believe that he is being punished for beating them, saying that the cameras are not going anywhere.