The Pretoria High Court’s ruling that Hoërskool Overvaal does not have to admit 55 English-speaking learners is encouraging and once again only goes to show that the political games being played by the Gauteng Department of Education is only to the detriment of both white and black learners and their parents, says adv Anton Alberts, chairperson of the FF Plus.
Adv Alberts says that with this judgement, the court confirmed that the Gauteng Department of Education is manipulating the educational system in such a way that racial polarisation becomes inevitable when Afrikaans schools that are filled to capacity are forced to admit English-speaking learners even though they really can’t.
“The FF Plus has determined numerous times that not enough schools are being built in Gauteng to accommodate all the languages on the one hand and on the other, that existing infrastructure is underutilised; and this case has just confirmed that.
“Clearly the court also found that under the lead of Panyaza Lesufi, the Gauteng Department of Education is more interested in politics than in doing their Constitutional duty by ensuring that there are enough facilities to accommodate learners of all languages.
“The ruling is encouraging and I hope that if it is appealed, the Court of Appeal will uphold it,” says adv Alberts.
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