Pretoria Girls High, GDE to face off in court on Tuesday
The governing body of Pretoria High School for Girls and the Gauteng Education Department will do battle in the High Court on Tuesday.
The school is challenging the investigations into claims of racism.
The SGB argues the probe was unlawful, seeking to halt the recommendations and access the full report.
This while the department has defended the investigation, citing statutory authority and insisting dissatisfaction does not equate to unlawfulness.
The independent investigation into allegations of racism at the school found principal Phillipa Erasmus and her deputy principal guilty of misconduct.
The investigation was commissioned by the Gauteng Department of Education after 12 pupils were accused of sharing racist micro-aggressions in a whites-only WhatsApp group.
While the school cleared the students of wrongdoing during a disciplinary hearing in August, the department continued with its investigation.
The report made damning findings against the school principal and deputy, including their failure to address longstanding complaints and bullying.
In October, the Thabo Mbeki Foundation questioned the handling of the racism storm at school.
Former president Mbeki revealed that he had personally inspected the contents of the WhatsApp conversations and failed to find any evidence of racism.
“We ourselves have also closely studied the comments made by the chat group, independently to determine whether these constituted manifestations of racism and hate speech,” Mbeki said in a letter to Gauteng Premier Panyaza Lesufi and MEC of Education Matome Chiloane.
“It seems, for some reason, that the GDE was determined to smear the PHSG with the charge of racism,” he added.
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