Primary school teacher sues Dokora for 'illegal' transfer

A PRIMARY school teacher has dragged the Minister of Primary and Secondary Education, Lazarus Dokora, and the Civil Service Commission (CSC) to the Bulawayo High Court challenging her transfer to a rural school in the Midlands Province.

Kwekwe Primary School teacher Gamuchirai Chabata is fighting her transfer back to Vulamatshena Primary School in Zhombe, barely a year after she left the same school.

In court papers, she said she received a letter from the Education Ministry on January 5 notifying her of the transfer with immediate effect.

Chabata, through her lawyers Mutatu and Partners, filed an urgent chamber application at the Bulawayo High Court seeking an order that permanently interdicts Dokora and the CSC from transferring her to Zhombe without her consent.

In papers before the court, Chabata is the applicant while Dokora and the CSC were cited as the respondents.

"The primary reason for my application is that I'm a married woman and my husband and family are resident in Kwekwe and therefore it is important for us to stay together. It's my belief that our custom and even the law supports and respect the union of a family," argued Chabata in her founding affidavit.

She said last year in March, she successfully requested for a transfer from Zhombe to Kwekwe.

"On March 11, 2015 I received a transfer letter from the respondents to the effect that my application for transfer was approved and I was being moved from Vulamatshena to Kwekwe Primary School. Following the approval of my application it was indeed a dream come true for me because I really wanted to reunite with my family which includes two minor children attending school at Kwekwe Primary School," she said.

Chabata said she was shocked when she received a letter on January 5 this year ordering her to return to Vulamatshena Primary School.

"I was surprised and shocked when I was served with a letter from the first respondent (Dokora) stating that I was being transferred back to Vulamatshena," she said.

Chabata said the transfer was prejudicial and detrimental to her and her family and urged the court to reverse it.

"I never made a request to be re-transferred back to Vulamatshena. The decision by the respondents to re-transfer me was unilaterally made without my request and such a decision affects my natural right," she said.

Chabata argued that in terms of transfer regulations, a transfer has to be planned to minimise discomfort on the part of the affected person or his/her family.

The teacher's case comes at a time when the Zimbabwe Teachers Association (Zimta) has also dragged the Education Ministry and the CSC to court for cancelling teachers' vacation leave.

This week, the Minister of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare Prisca Mupfumira said that no teacher would go on vacation leave until the government was in a position to pay relief teachers who replace them for the three months they would be away.

The government last week recalled 2,000 teachers who were supposed to be on leave this term, a development that irked Zimta, and the dispute has since spilled into the labour Court.

A circular delivered to all schools across the country indicated that CSC officials would soon be visiting schools to ensure that teachers complied with the order. Zimta has since advised its members to remain on leave as the matter was before the courts.