An 11-year-old student lowered into a pit latrine to retrieve the principal's phone emerged covered in feces

• South African principal Lubeko Mgandela lowered a boy into a latrine to find his phone, reports say.
• The 11-year-old searched for an hour with his hands and was lifted out of the pit covered in feces.
• Mgandela was charged with child abuse. On Wednesday, he appeared in court and was released on bail.

A principal has been charged with child abuse after lowering an 11-year-old student into a pit latrine in order to retrieve his phone, the AP reported.

The BBC reported that Lubeko Mgandela, the principal of Luthuthu Junior Secondary School in Eastern Cape, South Africa, dropped his phone into the school's outdoor toilet earlier this month.

The AP said that Mgandela used a thick rope to secure the boy and lower him into the latrine to search for the phone with his bare hands. The student was unable to find it and was lifted out of the pit covered in feces.

The principal originally promised to pay the student rand 200 ($13), but instead paid him rand 50 ($3) for his efforts, the AP reported.

Local media reported that the incident only came to light after a nongovernmental organization that promotes school attendance in the area heard about it.

Petros Majola, the director of the Khula Community Development Project, uploaded a video that has since gone viral and said that the search for the phone took an hour, the BBC reported.

The grandmother of the student, both of whom have not been named, told local news outlet GroundUp that she is happy that the case is getting attention and that Mgandela is being held accountable.

She said, "It has been hard for my grandchild to go to school because he has been laughed at by other pupils."

Mgandela appeared in court and was released on bail Wednesday, the AP said.

Fundile Gade, Eastern Cape's member of the executive council for education, told reporters, "It is beyond disgrace that such an incident of inhumanity can be claimed against a school principal who we view as a parent and mentor to everyone in that community."

In 2018, South Africa vowed that all schools would have proper toilets after two 5-year-olds died after falling into pit latrines.

But, the AP reported, more than 3,800, a sixth of all South Africa's schools, still use pit latrines despite the dangers, official figures found.