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Western Cape Education MEC Debbie Schafer. (Photo: Deon Raath)
- Education MEC Debbie Schafer will not release the department’s report at Brackenfell High and the contentious private event that only white students will attend.
- This is to “protect the confidential or sensitive information of third parties contained in the document,” he said.
- According to Schafer, the investigation found that the students had not been excluded from attending on the basis of race.
Western Cape MEC of Education Debbie Schafer will not release the report related to the provincial department’s investigation into allegations of a party attended by only white Brackenfell High students.
His spokesperson, Kerry Mauchline, said that Schafer decided to release the details in a statement, “given the need to clarify the facts in this matter and the many inaccuracies that were released regarding this fact.”
“The report itself is not being distributed, given the need to protect the confidential or sensitive information of third parties contained in the document,” he said after News24 requested a copy.
Schafer this week, in a statement, said the investigation had found that the event was a privately organized matrix bachelorette attended by Brackenfell High School students and that the students had not been excluded from attending on the basis of race.
He said the invitation did not refer to the school and that the party, which cost 500 rand to enter, was held in a private location after the official farewell was canceled.
A media provider, who also uses the school, uploaded images to the school’s website “by mistake.”
READ | Brackenfell High: Education department finds no evidence that a ‘private party’ excluded students on the basis of race
“He specified that it was limited to 100 people, after [representatives of] the venue reported that they could increase the number of attendees from 50 to 100 as a result of the relaxation of Covid regulations. “
Schäfer said that the invitation was widely distributed through WhatsApp groups and that the parent who organized the event asked class representatives to distribute it to WhatsApp groups in his class. The director confirmed that this was done.
A hundred people could attend, Schafer said. The invitation was posted on the organizer’s Facebook page and was open to outsiders of the school. In the end, 42 students from Brackenfell High School attended, with 30 from other surrounding schools.
Four teachers were invited in their personal capacity because they had “close personal ties” with the organizing parent, and while the school knew the event was happening, it was considered a private event, Schafer said.
The report acknowledged that the incident highlighted other instances of racial tensions at the school, which the school “has freely acknowledged,” Schäfer said.
To address these issues, the school, among others, pledged to form a “diversity committee” in June, following accusations of racist behavior by some people.
Meanwhile, Judge Siraj Desai was expected to deliver judgment on December 22 on an injunction request filed by the school’s governing body (SGB) against the EFF protesting in front of the school grounds.
This, after multiple protests near the school premises in recent weeks that ended in violence.
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