Supreme Court gives Wesley Girls High School 14 days to respond to religious policy allegations

The plaintiff, Shafic Osman is at the Supreme Court alleging that Wesley Girls Senior High School’s policy which forces Muslim girls to attend christian service and prevent the Muslim girls from practicing their religion is inconsistent with the the provisions of the 1992 constitution.

In court today, the seven-member panel hearing the case which has Justice Gabriel Pwamang as the president was of the view that the school’s board of directors needed to respond to these factual allegations to help the court to establish the facts if they wish to.

Meanwhile, the court has given the Deputy Attorney-General, Dr Justice Srem-Sai who represented the Ministry of Education leave to file his amended statement of case replacing the file he filed earlier:

In his amended statement of case, the A-G is arguing that Wesley Girls High School, is owned by the Methodist Church and not the state hence has the right to practice its religion in line with Methodist Christian Faith.

He added that Wesley Girls High School is entitled to government funding despite its character of religious ownership.

As a result, he is of the view that the state cannot take away the religious rights of the school on simply because the school receives government funding.

In a related development, Democracy Hub, represented by Oliver Barker-Vormawor has filed an application to offer information to the court on the determination of the matter.