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Auxilia Katongomara Chronicle Reporter
A parent of a pupil attending St Thomas Aquinas Primary School in Bulawayo has filed an urgent chamber application at the High Court seeking an order to stop the school authorities from barring his child from attending lessons over non-payment of fees.
Sanders Ganyanhewe, who is the applicant in the matter, filed the application through his lawyer, Russel Dzete of Marondedze , Mukuku and Partners, seeking an order barring the school and the headmaster from stopping his child from attending classes.
According to the court papers, St Thomas Aquinas Primary, a private school in Kumalo suburb, was cited as the first respondent, Minister of Primary and Secondary Education, Lazarus Dokora as the second respondent and the school headmaster, Cuthbert Chiromo as the third.
Ganyanhewe in his founding affidavit said it was unlawful for the school and headmaster to punish his son by excluding him from classes and causing him to sit in isolation.
“I am the parent to a minor child who is enrolled at the school and attending Grade 4 classes there. As one of the conditions of enrolment of the minor, I am obviously expected to pay tuition fees at the institution on a termly basis.
“However, of late I have defaulted in making payments to the institution for the academic term. During the week commencing June, 3, 2015, the third respondent (the headmaster) has religiously forced my son to sit in isolation in the school hall every morning as punishment for my failure to tender tuition fees on time,” said Ganyanhewe.
The parent said after learning about the plight of his son at school, he approached his lawyers to address Chiromo and advise him that such course of action was unwarranted.
“Punishing my son, by excluding him from classes and causing him to sit in isolation is unlawful and amounts to taking the law into one’s hands, especially in light of the various options available to the first and third respondents in collecting tuition fees.
“I submit that the first and third respondents have no right to take the law into their own hands and punish the minor child and subject him to cruelty by making him sit alone in a school hall. As a parent, it hurts to learn that my child is isolated in a cold school hall from 7.30AM to 1PM when I eventually collect him. For almost eight hours my son is in isolation,” wrote Ganyanhewe.
He said he had a meeting with Chiromo who scorned at the course of action he had taken and was unapologetic to him. Ganyanhewe said the headmaster told him that for as long as the child came to school, he would subject him to the same ‘cruel and inhuman treatment’ that he has repeatedly and systematically applied.
Ganyanhewe argued that his child had a constitutionally enshrined right to education.
“We therefore now approach this court on an urgent basis for an interdict in the form of an order barring the first and third respondents, their agents and assignees from isolating or barring the minor child referred to herein from attending his normal classes,” said Ganyanhewe.
Earlier this month, a Grade 7 pupil at Whitestone Primary school filed an application challenging her expulsion from the school over non-payment of fees. The pupil, Zoe Zonde, was barred from attending lessons owing to fees arrears amounting to $1,000.
However, Zoe, and her father, Shorai Zonde, later withdrew the matter from the court and were made to pay the full fees and also ordered to pay $1,500 legal costs incurred by the school.
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