More than 20 teachers were held at gunpoint at a Durban school on Wednesday as two classes were about to write a matric paper, KwaZulu-Natal police said.
The incident took place at Chatsworth’s Savannah Park Secondary School at 7.40am, Chatsworth police spokesperson Captain Edmund Singh said.
Two security guards standing at the school’s front gate were approached by four armed men who demanded cellphones and directions to the staff room.
”The guards refused to hand over their cellphones.”
One of the robbers then took the two guards to the staff room at gunpoint, while the three other suspects kept guard outside the school.
”The robber entered the staff room and held 23 educators at gunpoint,” Singh told the South African Press Association.
Jewellery to the value of R20 000 was taken, along with R20 000-worth of cellphones and about R2 000 in cash.
”When the three suspects outside realised the alarm had been activated, they ran off and hijacked another female educator of her vehicle,” said Singh.
Police later found the woman’s Toyota Yaris abandoned in Mariannhill.
”The teachers are all traumatised but there were no injury reports,” he said.
Two matric classes were about to write exams at the time.
”But this had nothing to do with exams. It was a criminal matter and there were no disruptions of classes,” he said.
KwaZulu-Natal education department spokesperson Christie Naude said: ”I am disturbed that robbers keep targeting schools … and this was a school with security guards,” she said.
She said a team of psychologists would be sent to the school to counsel the teachers and pupils.
Police were investigating an armed robbery and hijacking case.
No arrests had been made. — Sapa