What started as an LLB research paper at the Rhodes Faculty of Law has culminated in an R8.2 billion settlement agreement requiring the state to replace all mud structure schools and provide basic services in under resourced schools.
In 2007, final year law student Cameron McConnachie undertook research entitled Basic Education – A Right Awaiting Definition. In this research, McConnachie questioned whether the right to basic education (as set out in section 29(1)(a) of the Constitution) included the right to adequate physical resources such as the provision of buildings, desks, textbooks, stationery, water and toilets.
He further considered whether it would be possible for schools to make a successful application to court to ensure the progressive realisation of these education rights. Finding in the affirmative on both points, he concluded that the state had failed to meet the standard required by the Constitution.
McConnachie, a school teacher before studying law at Rhodes University, joined the Legal Resources Centre (LRC), a non-profit, public-interest law firm that focuses on “impact litigation”, in Grahamstown in 2009.
At the LRC McConnachie sought to test his research conclusions. In a 2010 court order involving Amasango Special School, the LRC secured its first victory for an under resourced school.
The lessons learned from this intervention were expanded when the LRC assisted seven rural communities in instituting legal proceedings against the state demanding improved infrastructure. This culminated in the R8.2 billion out of court settlement on 4 Feb 2011 to assist similarly under-resourced schools across the country.
This is a massive victory for those who are most vulnerable in our society, and is testament to the fact that research in universities can make a real difference.
In the words of a legal academic (Newman): “If social and economic rights are to mean anything to human lives, they cannot exist only at an abstract level.”
Research Paper click here
Law Memorandum of Agreement click here