An advocate who wrote an exam for an additional qualification, but only received a 16% mark, was so upset about this that she turned to the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria, to, among others, demand that her exam paper be remarked.
Ithumeleng Sekukuni subsequently wanted an undisclosed amount of damages from the Legal Practice Council, through which she wrote the exam, and from the examiner, an advocate Yolande Jansen.
She felt defamed as Jansen, in marking her paper, remarked on the paper in Afrikaans “ongemerk” (not marked) as well as “in potlood” (the Afrikaans word for pencil.
Sekukuni asked the Legal Practice Council after receiving her marks, why her paper was not marked completely and what was the meaning of the words jotted down on her exam paper.
She was told that it meant pencil, but the advocate felt that the examiner on purpose did not want her to succeed in passing her exam.
It was pointed out to Sekukuni that it was clearly marked on the exam paper that the answers had to be in pen.
Sekukuni contended that the main reason for seeking the relief from the court was “to right a wrong” and to get her paper marked and to pass.
She said that it was not brought for monetary gain which she argued was evident from her claim for an undisclosed amount of damages.
She said: “I don’t have sinister intentions to crass monetary aspirations. My aim is to pass the exam and earn my money the right way.”
In March 2022, Sekukuni together with other candidates wrote the legal practitioner’s bookkeeping exam.
The exam paper contained four questions. It also contained a cover sheet which informed each candidate about the manner in which the paper was to be answered.
One of the instructions was that candidates were only allowed to write in pen.
Sekukuni completed all four questions but failed to write all her answers in pen, writing some of her answers partly in pen and partly in pencil.
Jansen did not mark the answers which were written in pencil and only marked the answers written in pen.
The LPC released all the exam results on its website. Sekukuni was unhappy with her results and requested to be provided with a copy of her script to see how this had happened. She said she would have definitely passed if all her answers were marked.
She then demanded her paper be completely marked afresh, at the costs of the Legal Practice Council, and that she then be provided with the correct mark.
She also wanted Jansen to email her an apology regarding her “insolent conduct, the defamatory and derogatory words she dared to write on my paper”. This referred to the “potlood” remarks.
When her demands were not adhered to, she turned to court.
Judge Linda Retief turned down her application for numerous reasons, but one of the reasons included that Sekukuni had other options -- she could have rewritten the exam if she wanted to, or asked for a remark.
But the latter option required that the candidate had to double pay for the marking and that the money would be refunded if the candidate passed.
ZELDA VENTER