CAPE TOWN - A teacher who spanked a Grade 10 learner on her buttocks has been axed, thanks to his victim’s no-nonsense stand that he should face the music for the sexual assault.
Lucky Baloyi, a physical science teacher at Kgomotso Comprehensive High School in Soshanguve, Pretoria, learnt his fate this week.
Education Labour Relations Council arbitrator Monde Boyce found Baloyi guilty as charged and ruled that he should be summarily dismissed over the sexual assault in April.
The Gauteng Department of Education had proffered a charge of sexual assault against Baloyi.
He spanked the learner’s buttocks at the school’s laboratory. But had Learner A, as his victim is identified in Boyce’s ruling, listened to the advice of a teacher, Baloyi would have remained unpunished.
The learner reported the sexual abuse to a number of teachers. One of them advised her to write a letter to Baloyi and explain to him that she did not like what he did.
This approach appears to not have made any sense to her and, as Boyce pointed out in the ruling, she “did not write the letter because she felt she was not being taken seriously”.
Said Boyce: “She decided to report the incident to her parents. “She had also told a fellow learner, Learner C, who had advised her to report the incident ...”
Baloyi was accordingly charged after Learner A told her father and her aunt.
It became common cause before Boyce that Baloyi had called Learner A into the laboratory by WhatsApp to help her upload her work onto a CD. Like Learner A, the father, Learner B and Learner C – as they were identified in the ruling – told Boyce they had nothing against Baloyi.
For his part, Baloyi sought to create an impression that Learner A was being used against him by the two learners who testified and teachers. Boyce shot this down: “After having heard evidence, it is my finding that this claim is far-fetched ...”
He concluded the evidence before him proved Baloyi’s guilt on a balance of probabilities.
Cape Times