Educators in KwaZulu-Natal — under the auspices of their union the National Professional Teachers' Organisation of South Africa (Naptosa) — have secured an interim interdict blocking the provincial education department from implementing a circular which the union alleged would result in job cuts at many schools.
On Friday, Pietermaritzburg high court judge Jacqui Henriques granted the order in favour of 28 school principals and 43 union members.
She stopped the department from implementing what has become a controversial circular issued at the end of November dealing with staffing at government schools for the 2025 and 2026 academic years.
She gave the department until April to make submissions on why the interdict should not be made final. Until then, she ordered that the status quo in respect of post establishments for 2024 remains.
The department opposed Naptosa’s urgent application, relying mainly on technical issues. Henriques dismissed all of these. She said the union had made a case for urgency, that the union had been presented with a “fait accomplis” and had attempted to resolve the matter with the department before heading to court.
The action by Naptosa members comes in the wake of the provincial department of education slashing dozens of teachers posts for the 2025 academic year which would literally leave classrooms with no teachers.
Forty-eight schools and their governing bodies launched an urgent application in December securing an interdict stopping the educator cull. The following week several other schools made a similar successful application.
In both matters the department capitulated. It now has until April to make submissions on why those interdicts should not be made final.
At issue in all the matters is a circular sent to schools in November — after the legislated South African Schools Act (Sasa) annual deadline of September — in which schools were informed of how many government-funded posts had been allocated to the schools for the following year.
The effects of it, it is alleged, were that many government-funded posts were slashed. It meant that governing bodies had no time to fundraise or budget for governing body posts to replace these teachers.
It also left those in the “firing line” with uncertainty over whether they would have jobs or would have to reapply to different schools, if there were vacancies.
The schools, governing bodies and union members said it would result in an “education catastrophe” in the province.
In her affidavit, Naptosa provincial head Thirona Moodley said the department was not only acting contrary to Sasa, but also to its contractual obligations and public policy which was “detrimental to schools, learners and educators”.
The overriding emphasis was to provide stability at schools through adequate staffing which formed part of collective agreements with the department and the unions.
Moodley said according to those agreements, the post establishments of school had to remain constant for a three-year cycle, except if there were significant changes in enrolments or the school was closed permanently.
The union prefers an outdated methodology to continue for the mere reason that this is how things were done in the past
— KZN education department
The present cycle began in January 2024 and thus should have continued until the end of December 2026.
She said the department had issued the first circular for post establishment at the end of November and then, a day before schools closed, had issued another one. The effect of this was that some schools lost up to nine educator posts.
Moodley said at a meeting, the chief director responsible for staffing had conceded that an “incorrect weighting and data” had been used by untrained personnel.
However, in its response, the department denied this and stuck to its guns.
It said the circular reflected a “new model formulated by an expert in the field” which would have long-term benefits for education in the province and the union preferred “an outdated methodology to continue for the mere reason that this is how things were done in the past”.
The department said the majority of schools were satisfied with their educator numbers. Those that were not had submitted contestations which were being dealt with.
It also said no teachers would lose their jobs but would be redeployed.
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