The government’s increasingly unpopular zeal to close down village schools has led to at least 10 injunctions being lodged in the courts. Público newspaper reports that more may follow.
The news is heart-warming for any parent whose child’s nurturing village school faces the axe. Injunctions are becoming the flavour of the month, it seems, with the effect that the schools’ closure has to be put on hold until a court decision, explains Público.
Better still, as expert Vieira de Andrade points out: “It’s natural that some courts will find good arguments in a lot of these injunctions” – which will lead to them suspending the government’s closure bid altogether.
For now, only 10 injunctions, affecting a fraction of the 311 schools under threat, are on the drawing board – but Público’s research shows that others are in the pipeline.
The borough of Guimarães, for instance, has drawn up papers to fight the closure of six local schools – one of which has more than 26 pupils (21 is the Government’s imposed ‘limit’ regarding viability. Any school with less has little chance of being allowed to survive).
In Amarante, the parish of Gondar has said it will use “all legal means at its disposal” to fight the closure of a school that has 37 children (well over the government imposed limit), while in Belmonte council chiefs are fighting the closure of three schools.
Elsewhere, Idanha-a-Nova, Cuba, S. Pedro do Sul e da Covilhã, Chaves and Anadia are all poised to lodge government-frustrating injunctions.
