Universities SA slams student protests as misdirected

Universities South Africa has condemned the mass unrest across campuses this week, describing it as misdirected.

The body has urged students to engage in dialogue in bid to find lasting solutions for the problems facing tertiary institutions.

At the University of Cape Town, classes were moved online due to at least three days of disruptive protests. 

At Wits University, students clashed with campus security on Thursday following the interruption of lectures and urged others to join demonstrations.

Universities South Africa has described the protests as counterproductive, saying students should take funding concerns to NSFAS or the government. It cautions that universities are not the primary source of student funding. 

The organisation has accused students of sabotaging the academic agenda they seek to access.

However, Wits University students on the frontlines of protest action say they’re willing to risk everything, including suspension, to fight for every student’s right to accessible education. 

Wits SRC Deputy President, Boipelo Setsepu, has called on students to stand together.

“We’ve been calling for management to allow all students to register since last year, December,” he said. “We need to remain united, if we really want management to hear our cries. We need to make sure that all students stand with us. And that’s why we say we are going to fetch our brothers and sisters from lecture halls,” he said.

Today’s mass shutdown at the institution coincided with day seven of a hunger strike organised by two unregistered postgraduate students.

 

Campus medical staff have raised concerns over the deteriorating health of the students on hunger strike. 

Postgraduate students, Siviwe Mafuna and Feziwe Ndwayana, are the students who ignited the fire at Wits.

Mafuna was today taken in for close medical supervision, with intervals of water doing little to alleviate his symptoms.

Medical tests revealed the first sign of ulcers due to his lack of food.

Ndwayana says it’s concerning that despite their fragile state, university management has refused to engage them.

“They talk about us, they don’t talk to us. They talk to the media…. So we don’t know what they really want. Perhaps they do want us to die in front of them, and that’s what will happen because if black people are sent away from institutions of higher learning, they go back to township and rural areas where we believe it’s like a death sentence,” she said.

Meanwhile, unregistered students are growing increasingly anxious, hoping the protesters’ actions will yield a resolution.

They are calling for an extension of this week’s registration deadline.