The Chronicle
21 January 2013
ACTING Bulawayo High Court judge, Justice Meshack Cheda has dismissed an urgent chamber application by a Rastafarian family seeking the reinstatement of its child to a school she was expelled from on religious grounds.
Mr Patson Makhiwa, whose 13-year-old daughter was last week expelled from the Seventh Day Adventist-run Bulawayo Adventist Secondary School (BASS) for wearing dreadlocks, had sought a provisional order against the school after the expulsion.
However, Justice Cheda ruled that the provisional order could not be granted because the Applicant’s child was declared to be a member of the Seventh Day Adventist Church when in fact she was a Rastafarian thereby fraudulently acquiring a place.
He said on that basis alone, the school would still be entitled to cancel the admission of the child and dismissed the application with no order as to costs.
A pastor at the Davidson Seventh Day Adventist Church allegedly filled the admission form for the girl, Â where her stepmother is a member and she would go with her on a regular basis.
The church is a breakaway group from the mainstream SDA to which BASS belongs.
The Applicant had cited the Minister of Education, Sport, Arts and Culture David Coltart, BASS and the school’s headmaster, a Mr N Marandure, as 1st, 2nd and 3rd respondents respectively.
While the respondents’ lawyer, Ms Nomsa Ncube, of Lazarus and Sarif Legal Practitioners submitted that the girl’s admission was based on misinformation, the applicant through his legal representatives, Mr Jonathan Tsvangirai, of Dube-Tachiona and Tsvangirai Legal Practitioners maintained that there was nothing fraudulent because the girl’s stepmother was a regular member of the breakaway SDA church while the father was not aware of the admission form, which was only availed to him in court.
The applicant’s lawyer is now considering making an application for leave to appeal to the Supreme Court, as they feel the court erred in upholding the school’s decision of segregating the girl on the basis of religion.
It is the applicant’s contention that the SDA-run school is segregatory and would have even not offered the girl a place had she said she was Rastafarian on the admission form.
This comes after the school’s argument that it offered the girl a place because she said she was SDA.
The girl has been wearing dreadlocks since she was three years old and finished Grade Seven last year at Hillside Primary School where she attained seven units.
She applied for a Form One place at BASS and was invited for entrance tests, which she passed.
The school enrolled her but expelled her from the school on the opening day on 8 January, as the school accused her of having dreadlocks, which it said was against its rules.
The girl has not been going to school for the past two weeks and the family said she is now traumatised.
The applicant said the school should have told the girl that she was not eligible on the day she went for the interviews because the locks were noticeable.
The applicant accuses the respondents of trying to force the girl to denounce her religion and to cut her dreadlocks, which is against her religion, as a Rastafarian.
In his founding affidavit, the applicant said he is a Rastafarian and his daughter is a Rastafarian. He said he did not know about the application form, which was filled by the pastor, who knew the girl as a regular at the church and her stepmother accompanied her to the school.
The girl had been going to the church for sometime in the company of the stepmother, who the applicant said was trying to blend with her by going with her to church.
The applicant said he was not shown any copy of the school’s rules.
The grounds on which the application was made are that the minor child has been barred from entering the school premises and from attending classes until she complies with the “illegal†demand made by the 2nd and 3rd respondents to cut her dreads, which is contrary to her beliefs, as a Rastafarian.
The applicant further said it would not be in the interests of the minor child to be denied education, which is an inherent right of any child of her age and barring her from school is in violation of Section 19 of the Constitution of Zimbabwe.
He said soon after the child was accepted as a pupil, he paid fees in full and the school authorities saw the girl with dreadlocks, which she had not cut since birth.
The applicant said he had previously communicated with the school’s deputy head, who told him that the child would not be discriminated on the grounds of her religion.
He said he believed the deputy head’s words, as the girl was offered a place and her money accepted.