Court sustains parents’ injunction against St. Andrew’s

 has sustained an injunction granted to 83 parents stopping trustees of Saint Andrew’s International Primary School in Blantyre from executing their duties.

Through private practice lawyer Happy Mwangomba, the parents argued that the trust was acting illegally as its members did not sign the trust deeds after dissolution of the Designated Schools Board in 1998. The board was managing St Andrew’s alongside other international schools.

In the ruling dated December 5 2022, High Court Judge Jack N’riva noted that the case has some serious questions that need to be tried.

He said sustaining the injunction the parents obtained on August 22 2022 will not affect the school’s operations much as it is not a good corporate practice for trustees to be running the institution’s day to day activities.

Reads the ruling in part: “Looking at the claims, it appears to me that the interest of justice would better be served if the order of injunction subsisted until the claim is determined or until the court orders otherwise.

“It appears to the court that, in all the circumstances of the matter, it is just to sustain the order of interlocutory injunction. Therefore, the court orders the continuation of the interlocutory order of injunction.”

In his submission after joining the case in August, Attorney General Thabo Chakaka Nyirenda told the High Court in Blantyre that legally, the international primary school belonged to the Malawi Government.

He said: “The property belongs to the government. There was no instrument that shows that the school was transferred to the trustees.

“The trust is void and ownership has to revert to government. School fees are over K3 million per term, does it exist for the benefit of the public?”

But in their submission, the board of trustees through their lawyers Noel Chalamanda and Fred Chipembere dismissed the AG’s assertions that the school belonged to government.

Said Chalamanda: “St. Andrew’s is not assisted by government or a government school. When we say the school, we don’t mean the land or buildings, but the thoughts behind the school.

“Ministry of Education has not done its part. Isn’t it reasonable that the Secretary for Education should have issued a trust deed?”

B u t i n r e s p o n s e t o Chalamanda’s arguments, Mwangomba told the court that there has been a successful board of trustees who have done nothing in terms of following up on the delay to sign a trust deed.

One of the concerned parents James Kaphale, a corporate law expert, said in an interview justice had prevailed. He said as concerned parents, they were waiting for substantive issues for which they obtained the injunction to be heard in court.

Founded in 1938 by the Church of Scotland Mission in Blantyre, the school is an accredited provider of the English National Curriculum in Malawi.