Chairperson, 18 matric pupils from Ballito in KwaZulu- Natal may have to repeat this year as the school they have been attending is not registered with the Department of Education.
The school principal downloaded fake and fraudulent papers from the Internet, pasted the Department of Education logo on them and gave them to the pupils to write matric. The papers had no security features such as the barcode, and the matric examination numbers issued were also fake. The situation was discovered quite by accident when a parent of one of the affected learners happened to see a paper written by another school and realised that the two papers were completely different.
Whilst a case of fraud against the principal has been lodged, the impact on the learners is, indeed, far-reaching. It is hoped that the Minister of Education will consider the matter and allow the learners to take special supplementary examinations early next year in an effort to reduce the damage.