A teacher who allegedly separated black and white children in the Grade R class at Laerskool Schweizer-Reneke in North West has been suspended with immediate effect.
Education MEC, Sello Lehari, this will allow investigations to continue.
He said the school's explanation was that black children were separated because they were new at the school and could not speak Afrikaans or English.
"We did not accept the explanation," he told community members who were protesting outside the school today.
Lehari said a decision on the fate of the principal had not been taken.
The situation was tense at the school on Thursday morning, after a photo circulated on social media showing black children seated separately from their white classmates at a Grade R class at the school.
People wearing EFF, ANC and Forum 4 Service Delivery t-shirts, chanted at the school's gate, threatening to break the gate to gain entry into the school.
On the other side of the school, parents of white children broke a fence and removed their children, with some of the adults armed with firearms.
- African News Agency ( ANA)
