The class action court case led by the Grahamstown-based Legal Resources Centre (LRC) on behalf of 32 Eastern Cape schools against the EC Department of Education, has been postponed.
The class action court case led by the Grahamstown-based Legal Resources Centre (LRC) on behalf of 32 Eastern Cape schools against the EC Department of Education, has been postponed.
The case deals with the appointment of teachers to vacant posts and reimbursement to schools that paid teachers from their own reserves instead of the government. Sarah Shepton of the LRC told Grocott's Mail Monday that the case was postponed to allow the new acting Education Head Ray Tywakadi time to bring himself up to speed with the case's details.
The LRC is representing the School Governing Body (SGB) of Linkside High School in Port Elizabeth and the SGBs of 31 other affected schools in the Eastern Cape. The involved parties appeared briefly in the Grahamstown Magistrates Court on Thursday 31 July where Judge Clive Pasket postponed it until 30 October 2014. According to the LRC website, the number of teachers involved in the class action currently stands at 150 and they are owed up to R25 million.
In January the two parties came to an agreement requiring the Department of Basic Education to reimburse schools within 30 days of the court order. So far, no school has been reimbursed. George Dickerson Primary School Principal Melville Meiring told Grocotts the department owes his school around R80 000.
He said the school was paying four teachers from their own reserves, through school fees.
