Sne Masuku

Sne Masuku

The Congress of South African Students (Cosas) and teacher unions are to demand that the department of education extend the deadline for matrics to register to rewrite the subjects they failed.

The demand will be made on behalf of matriculants whose results are being withheld by principals and schools because they owe school fees or have lost school text books.

Cosas spokesman Isaac Luthuli said they have received reports from matriculants whose results were being withheld by schools.

He said Cosas will negotiate with the provincial education authorities to extend the registration deadline for supplementary exams.

"We are worried that some of the 55000 pupils who failed matric will miss an opportunity to improve their results."

He said pupils couldn't register to rewrite if they did not know which subjects they have failed.

He said in the first week of January, Cosas had been inundated with calls from concerned pupils.

Musa Gumede of the National Teachers Union said the union had also received reports that principals were withholding matric results.

"If this action continues the schools will be exposed and the principals disciplined," he said.

South African Democratic Teachers Union's Sipho Nkosi said if principals were withholding results, then the deadline should be extended.

The education department was unavailable for comment yesterday.