Motshekga taken to court

The Centre for Child Law is taking Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga to court over the shortage of teachers in the Eastern Cape.

The urgent application by the child rights group will be heard in the Eastern Cape High Court today.

"This application arises out of the failure of the minister and the Department of Basic Education to implement a court order of August 3, which directed the appointment of educators to vacant posts and to pay educators occupying those posts," the organisation's director, Ann Skelton, said.

Schools and their governing bodies have joined the application. The Centre for Child Law is being represented by the Legal Resources Centre.

Skelton said the applicants were asking the court to order the department to appoint 140 teachers in 17 Eastern Cape schools.

"We call on minister Motshekga to take urgent steps in terms of her powers to ensure that the crisis in the Eastern Cape is reversed and that teachers are appointed to vacant posts," Skelton said.

"Schools are being closed, children are not being taught, and further legal action was required in order to get teachers appointed."

Sarah Sephton, regional director of the LRC in Grahamstown, said the situation had already been "desperate" when the initial order was made by the court in August last year.

On Tuesday, the SA Democratic Teachers' Union called for Motshekga to resign immediately, saying it had lost confidence in her.

The union accused the minister of having withdrawn an agreement protecting collective bargaining.