Pretoria - The textbooks court application brought against the Basic Education Department has been removed from the court roll at the North Gauteng High Court in Pretoria.
The case -- initiated by lobby group Basic Education for All, through civil rights organisation Section27 -- was brought to the High Court this week, where the parties wanted the court to order the Basic Education Department to provide all outstanding books by 7 April.
However, North Gauteng High Court Judge Neil Tuchten said that the matter was not supposed to have come to court in the first place. Judge Tuchten encouraged the parties to reach an agreement outside court because the department had put in place systems to address all the matters regarding the delivery of textbooks in Limpopo.
The court urged the parties to reach an agreement or return to court on April 22 for argument. The applicants also told court that the department had addressed the issues they had raised as part of their court action.
Basic Education spokesperson Elijah Mhlanga said that an initial consignment of 6.9 million textbooks had thus far been delivered for the 2014 school year to 1.7million learners in 4 059 schools in Limpopo.
“Publishers are currently making deliveries of 387 000 textbooks from the order that was made on 20 March after schools reported shortages. The department has taken extraordinary steps to ensure that books are delivered on time and that any reported shortages are addressed,” Mhlanga said.
He said the department continues to welcome reports of shortages from anybody and these are attended to as a matter of urgency. – SAnews.gov.za
