Matrics will get their results
The Gauteng department of education on Tuesday assured matriculants that they will receive their results on January 7, as scheduled.
This was after The Star reported that teachers were threatening to boycott the matric results verification process due to them being short-changed in overtime pay, the occupation specific dispensation and money deducted for the 2007 teachers strike failing to be reimbursed.
The department, however, said teachers played no part in the verification process.
"Before the results are released, school principals are given a list of all the learners whose results have been captured to verify that none of their learners are missing from that list," it said in a statement.
"This is a quality assurance process and no teachers are involved in this verification.”
"Results will still be released even if this verification process is not done. The claim that learners might not get results without this verification is therefore untrue."
The Star quoted one teacher saying that the results needed to be verified by school principals and the exam staff had "resolved not to honour that function".
SA Democratic Teachers' Union (Sadtu) general secretary Mugwena Maluleke said as far as he was aware, teachers were not involved in the process.
He added that the union did not support a boycott as it was aware of the "technical" issues the department had encountered in implementing the OSD payments and was working with the department to correct them.
"I have not heard that teachers are part of the results verification process. I am hearing it for the first time," he said.
"Sadtu does not support a boycott... there is no dispute so far, so we cannot support any action," he said.
The department said it was aware that some educators might not have received their full OSD payments and urged them to notify the human resources department of the discrepancies so that they could be corrected.
It said that a full audit and verification process was planned for early in the new year to correct the problem.
"Educators do not qualify for overtime pay. If there are district staff who may not have been paid overtime, they are similarly requested to come forward so that we can deal with their matter on a case by case basis," it added.
Sapa
