IN
THE HIGH COURT OF SWAZILAND
CIVIL
CASE NO.2452/99
In
the matter between:
JOSEPHINE
MLOTJWA APPLICANT
AND
TEACHING
SERVICE COMMISSION 1st RESPONDENT
ATTORNEY
GENERAL 2nd RESPONDENT
CORAM:
MATSEBULA J
FOR
THE PLAINTIFF:
FOR
THE DEFENDANT:
RULING
On
the 22nd October 1999 the Applicant moved a notice of application for
the following relief:
1. That
1st Respondent pays Applicant her retirement benefits;
2. Costs
of application.
The
notice of application was accompanied by an affidavit by the
Applicant herself. In her affidavit she stated inter alia that she
had way back in 1993 applied for early retirement from the services
of
2
First
Respondent. She annexed a letter dated 13th January 1993. She was
doing this so that she does not lose her benefits accumulated over a
period of time.
On
the 22nd April 1993 First Respondent responded and requested
Applicant to furnish certain documents. This was obviously to enable
First Respondent to consider the Applicant's application. The letter
of the 22nd April 1993 isannexure "B" and I will deal with
it below.
On
the 12th July 1995 Applicant wrote a letter to the Ministry of
Education and complained that a certain Mr. Muir had responded
negatively to her application and that she then applied to the
Principal Secretary by way of appeal who also responded negatively to
her application. She further appealed to Education Committee. Here
again a negative response was given. She was then appealing to the
Minister to decide the matter.
On
the 16th February 1999, the First Respondent addressed a letter to
the Applicant's attorneys and gave a detailed account of why
Applicant's application was unsuccessful. Reference was made to the
provisions of the Teaching Service Act which clearly sets out the
requirements for an early retirement and these are set out in
paragraph 2 and they read as follows:
We
refer to your numerous correspondence to us on this matter and we
apologise for the failure, neglect to respond to them. Our reason is
that we believed this matter had formally been put to rest between
ourselves and Mrs. Mlotshwa and your client.
Paragraph
1 It was clearly explained to Mrs. Mlotshwa when she took the
so-called early retirement that the rules under the Teaching Service
Act provides that no teacher could be allowed to retire from the
Service unless she's been in the pensionable service for a
3
period
of 10 years or more and has attained the age of 45 or more. And that
being a woman she must advance as her reasons for early retirement
being the fact that she has just married or was about to marry and
must also have the approval of the Director of Education.
I
must state here that none of these exceptions apply to the Applicant
and in the circumstances I cannot see how any interpretation of
statutes can assist her in the face of a clear and unambiguous
provisions of the Act. There is no merit in the application and
application is dismissed with costs.
J.M.
MATSEBULA
JUDGE
