The court ruled that in favour of the university’s plans to introduce monolingual English education in certain faculties from 2017.
Despite the seriousness of the ruling, which in affect means the university can continue to implement its English only policy, minority rights group AfriForum and labour movement Solidarity said they consider this to be merely “a temporary setback for the state of constitutionally-recognised language rights and Afrikaans as medium of instruction in South Africa”.
The Court ruled that the implementation process in favour of English as primary medium of instruction may continue until the dispute over the merits of the decisions by the University’s Senate and Council can be heard in 2017.
According to Alana Bailey, Deputy CEO of AfriForum, the legal team’s focus is now on the case of the merits of the decisions on the language policy itself.
“A full bench of judges had already ruled in July 2016 that the transition to a policy that offers English-only instruction was not only to the detriment of Afrikaans, but of all indigenous South African languages.”
According to Johan Kruger, Deputy Chief Executive of Solidarity, it is essential to recognise and protect language rights in order to promote quality education, mutual relations and stability. “The violation of rights cannot be in anyone’s interest.”
AfriForum and Solidarity regard Afrikaans-speaking students’ access to Afrikaans instruction to be of the utmost importance and is prepared to defend this right on all platforms. Both organisations also support the developing of private institutions that offer Afrikaans education and encourage the public to support both approaches.
