ROSINA AND James Komape’s lives have been hell after Rosina found their son’s body in a school’s pit toilet.
Almost four years later, they have not received an apology from the Department of Basic Education or the school’s SGB.
Now the family have been accused of trying to get rich off the death of their child!
There was shock in court yesterday as Advocate Simon Phaswane, for the State, suggested that while he understood that no amount of money would compensate for Michael’s life, the family wanted to get rich off his death.
Michael died on 20 January 2014 when he drowned in a pit toilet at Mahlodumela Primary School in Chebeng Village outside Polokwane. He was six.
Phaswane was questioning Michael’s brother Lucas (23) in the Polokwane High Court in Limpopo. The family became emotional when he suggested they were after money, but Lucas held his head up and answered questions.
“The court was told the proposed offer was an insult to the family. Do you know about that?”
Lucas said if the offer had been made earlier, it would have helped the family undergo therapy. He said the department should have come soon after the funeral, and asked why it took it so long to reach out to the family. He said all his family wanted was for the department to take responsibility.
Spokeswoman for Section27 – representing the Komapes – Nomatter Ndebele said: “Section27 calls on the Minister of Basic Education, on whose behalf Advocate Phaswane speaks in court, to urgently clarify whether he is acting on her instructions when he accuses members of the Komape family of being unbelievable when they describe aspects of their grief, lying and using their son’s horrific death to make money.”
The Komapes are suing the national and provincial education departments for R900 000 for shock and trauma, and R2 million in constitutional damages. The family rejected the department’s offer of R450 000.
Komape family members, including parents James (51) and Rosina (46), and sister Lydia (26), have already testified.
Lucas testified that he believed the death of his younger brother was caused by the negligence of the department, which he said did not fix school toilets.
Ndebele said: “This week we will make public a selection of postcards from mainly primary school pupils in Gauteng and the Western Cape expressing the feelings about the death of Michael.
“The postcards are addressed to Limpopo Education MEC Ishmael Kgetjepe. They express reasons why the pupils stand with Michael. The postcards will be hand-delivered to the MEC’s office.”
The case was adjourned to
today.
