Basic Education responds to The Star newspaper's editorial

The Star newspaper's editorial cannot go unanswered

The Editor of the Star Newspaper, needs to assist the Department of Basic Education by clarifying his position stated in the Editorial of today’s Star Newspaper titled “Act decisively on cheating pupils”. The Editorial itself is riddled with fictitious assumptions that make it clear the author has not made any attempt nor effort to actually go through the court documents.

Is the Editor suggesting that the Department should defy the court's interim interdict handed down by a High Court Judge over this past weekend?

It must be noted that the Department opposed the interim interdict brought against it by New Era College learners and parents. We were shocked and disappointed that the Judge upheld such an interim interdict considering the evidence and gravity of the charges against the learners, especially when considering the implications for the entire examination system.

We are equally perturbed by the Interim interdict however, we are told we are unable to appeal until it becomes a final order. There is currently no legal recourse for the Department to take but to comply with the court ruling. The results released to the learners implicated will remain interim until such time they are ratified by Umalusi by way of a certificate. It also needs to be noted that the investigations and hearings against these learners will continue and if found guilty they will be subjected to the normal sanctions as prescribed in the Regulations. So no learner gets away even though these results are released as ordered by the court.

It was not through loopholes that the judgement was granted as suggested in the editorial, it was at the discretion of the Judge involved.  Last year when we faced a similar court challenge, two different judges came to two different determinations in similar matters. The judge who presided over this matter is the same judge who ruled against us in one of the matters last year. We are confident that a different Judge may come to a different conclusion, unfortunately we cannot pursue that at this stage due to the fact that the court order is an interim one.

It is also untrue that nothing happened to the learners in KwaZulu Natal that were implicated in cheating in 2014, because the learners could not be traced. All learners that were guilty of group copying had their results nullified and those that did not present themselves to the hearings, were not issued with their final results or their certificates. This has sent out a strong message in this province and hence there is a significant reduction of such cases in the KwaZulu-Natal province.

We agree that it is sad that learners who studied for the exams are disadvantaged by those who cheat and seemingly get away with it. For this reason we released a media statement after the Judgement stating such. We do plan to follow due process in this matter and will continue to fight for the integrity of the examination system to the conclusion of this matter.

It is far from the truth for the newspaper to suggest we are lenient towards those who cheat in exams because the department was heavily criticised when it imposed the three year maximum ban of those found guilty for cheating in exams.

The department on annual basis strengthens and enhances its processes on the basis of our findings from the previous examinations. In 2016 we categorised all our exam centres based on their risk profile, and those centres that were classified as high risk were not allowed to conduct the examination and the medium risk centres were subjected to intensive monitoring. In addition national training of invigilators, based on a national invigilator manual was organised across all PEDS.

We would advise the newspaper to place its anger in the correct place and ask how could the judiciary allow such a travesty of justice. Judges are not beyond reproach or immune to mistakes and we plan to take this fight further when the time arises. Editors too are not beyond reproach and should refrain from commenting on things they are not competent or informed adequately on, they have a responsibility to inform the public and should take that responsibility more seriously.

Enquiries:   
Elijah Mhlanga
Cell: 083 580 8275

Troy Martens
Cell: 079 899 3070

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