Sanco applauds ConCourt ruling on education
The South African National Civic Organisation (Sanco) on Friday, May 20, applauded the Constitutional Court (ConCourt) ruling on public schools. The ruling ensures that Gauteng MEC for Education, Panyaza Lesufi and the Provincial Department of Education should have power over pupil admission in all public schools.
“The landmark ruling has paved the way for schools to be integrated and transformation to be entrenched across the schooling system,” said Sanco national spokesperson, Jabu Mahlangu.
Mahlangu said that since the dawn of democracy, feeder zones determined by erstwhile apartheid education departments and former model C school governance structures had been used to perpetuate racism and exclusion of learners from historically disadvantaged communities.
“Access to quality public education will no longer be the preserve of minorities that have been using feeder zones to deny learners admission into public schools,” he said.
Last year, the Federation of Governing Bodies for South Africa (Fedsas) submitted that a number of admission regulations should be withdrawn. Fedsas had argued that schools should admit pupils according to feeder zones.
The organisation argued that Lesufi’s reasons for introducing the “impugned” regulations were without factual basis.
The MEC and the head of department (HOD) contended that public schools could not be governed in a manner that only catered for the interests of its incumbent parents and pupils.
However, the court on Friday morning found that none of the impugned regulations were unreasonable, unjustifiable or irrational. The court also dismissed Fedsas’s rule of requesting parents or guardians’ confidential information, such as payslips.
