Illegal Immigrants

The day Ato S. (GM) departs on his business trip to Dubai and Turkey, i get a frantic call from him. He wants me to check all the residency cards on every student’s Admission Form. He tells me to send every student home that does not have the valid documentation. I tell him to leave it to me and head directly to new Gerji Records Officer, Mehlat, to pass on the instructions. 

It takes almost the whole day and by the end of it, we find we have 74 illegal immigrants. Some of them are Ethiopian passport holders, but they still need validated Residence Permits. It’s embarrassing.

Rather than exclude 20% of the school, I decide to write directly to the offending parents requesting their urgent attention to get the relevant documentation, and offering apologies for those that may have received this letter by mistake. About three parents bring in copies. Two days later, i write a more urgent letter informing them that the school liable to prosecution, and issue a deadline of today to get the required permits.

A very angry and formidable Ethiopian mum, Mrs Wesley, arrives at school on Saturday in the mood for a fight. She reports she has now brought in her three children’s passport twice. I calmly inform her that whilst i appreciate her children have valid passports. she still lacks her daughters’ Resident Cards. If this is not produced by Monday morning, i will have to ask her to remove the children until the documentation is validated. 

In compensation i can offer her worksheets and homework assignments until the permits are ready. She starts berating me and the school for incompetence and all i can do is offer my most humble apologies, and yes indeed, it is the school’s fuck up. She is pacing up and down the corridor like a psychiatric ward inmate, ranting and screaming. Not for the first time i regret not bringing a vat-full of Prozac with me. She informs me it’s too late for her to get child minding cover and she tells me she’ll be dropping her kids into school whatever. All i do is ask her to “support the school” and “don’t put me in the situation where i have to turn them away from the premises”. But she is adamant. And i fear the worse.

I’m on campus by 7am, but i’m not the first on site. Little Mendini, a KG student from Swaziland, and another illegal immigrant beams at me from the monkey bars. We’ve managed to reduce the original 74 to just 16, but 16 is still too many for my liking.

Waiting outside my office is Mrs Wesley. Oh Fuck!!! I don’t need this first shite on a Monday morning. Amazingly she is contrite and apologises profusely for her rudeness. I’m flabbergasted. Apologies don’t seem to exist here – no-one wants to admit to a fuck up. Stunned al i can do is thank her for her apology and understanding. I run around the campus like a proverbial blue-assed fly trying to locate the remaining illicit students and passing out their exclusion orders for tomorrow. No doubt there will be other Mrs Wesley’s.  

Ms J holds the all important residency card