Category Archives: students

The Struggle Continues: A Road Blockade, Two Comrades Shot

Tuesday, 03 November 2015
Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement

The Struggle Continues: A Road Blockade, Two Comrades Shot

The struggle continues after our successful celebration of our ten year anniversary at the Curries Fountain stadium.

Road Blockade in Sisonke Village

Yesterday the Sisonke Village Abahlali branch (Lamontville) took to the street and blockaded the road after a long wait for a ward councillor to respond to their demand. The community of Sisonke have been in the area for fives years without water, electricity and toilets. Instead they have faced constant illegal and violent evictions. The local leadership of AbM have tried to have meetings with the ward councillor and wrote letters to her but she never responded. Continue reading

#FeesMustFall: Democracy Under Fire

Adam Haupt argues that both the corporatisation of universities and repression of student protests erode constitutional freedoms. The Con

The rise of the #FeesMustFall movement in South Africa has revealed key fault lines. I would like to offer two arguments here. The first is that the use of police brutality against peaceful protesters on campuses undermines citizens’ rights to free speech. The second is that the corporatisation of public institutions produces the same negative effects on the public sphere as state repression of dissent. Public institutions’ mandate to preserve an information commons is undermined by an economic system that places a low premium on public spending. Universities are thrown at the mercy of the market and, effectively, cost barriers to education are introduced. It is in this way that any talk of a national democratic revolution is reduced to empty rhetoric. Continue reading

Kafila: South African student protests and re-emergence of people’s power

Camalita Naicker, Kafila

The #nationalshutdown of all major universities in South Africa continues, even after a historic victory yesterday, when, after several days of mass mobilisation by students and workers President Jacob Zuma was forced to concede a zero-percent fee increase in university tuition fees next year. Yet, it was bittersweet for the more than twelve thousand people who marched to the Union Buildings in Pretoria who were, once again, tear-gassed and shot at with rubber bullets and stun grenades. The police turned violent when students began demanding, after waiting for several hours, that the President address them. Instead, Zuma chose to speak to the media in a press briefing and leave the students to the police. In Cape Town, students marched to the airport to show their solidarity with those in Pretoria; there too police fired rubber bullets, tear gas, and stun-grenades even as students fled into the neighbouring residential areas. For many, the victory it is only a partial one, a short-term solution deferring the problem to another day. It does not resolve the issue of unaffordable education nor does it address other important issues that the national action has been tied to like the outsourcing of labour on university campuses or the general discontents of the lack of transformation at higher education institutions in the country. Continue reading

Statement of Solidarity with Protesting Students

20 October 2015
Abahlali baseMjondolo Press Statement

Statement of Solidarity with Protesting Students

The whole country is watching the struggle of the students at universities around the country.

When we began our struggle ten years ago we felt that we were on our own. Today workers and students are also in struggle. Many are now organised outside of the ruling party that has so brutally repressed our struggle and many other struggles. We no longer feel that we are on our own. This is a time of new hope. Continue reading

Isolezwe: Kufe umfundi kubhikishwa enyuvesi

http://www.isolezwe.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=4571398

Kufe umfundi kubhikishwa enyuvesi

August 22, 2008 Edition 1

Sihle Mkhize

UPHELE sekumuncu umbhikisho wabafundi base-University of South Africa (Unisa) ophikweni lwayo lwaseThekwini ngesikhathi kushona umfundi oneminyaka engu-22 ubudala okusolakala ukuthi uhluleke ukuphefumula ngemuva kokuhilwa yisisi esikhipha unyembezi esiqhunyiswe ngesikhathi amaphoyisa ezama ukuhlakaza isixuku.

Lo mfundi ochazwe njengoMncedisi Noconjo ubenza unyaka wesine ezifundweni zomthetho.

Kulo mbhikisho, oqale ekuseni kule nyuvesi esemgwaqeni u-KE Masinga (Old Fort), kuphinde kwaboshwa abafundi abangu-15 ngamacala okudala udlame esidlangalaleni nokulimaza impahla.

Okhulumela amaphoyisa, u-Inspector Michael Read, uthe umfundi oshonile uqulekile ngesikhathi abafundi bebaleka, wathathwa nge-ambulensi ephuthunyiswa esibhedlela, washonela endleleni. URead uthe kusaphenywa ngembangela yokufa kwakhe.

Balinganiselwa ku-200 abafundi abebebhikisha bekhala ngezinguquko ezenziwe bengaziswanga ngendlela kule nyuvesi.

Lezi zinguquko zihlanganisa esokuthi kumele labo abazobhalisa kuyo basebenzise i-internet njengoba lungeke lusasetshenziswa uhlelo oludala lokuthi bashaye ujenga babhaliswe ngomabhalane.

USihlalo wenhlangano emele abafundi kwi-Young Communist League, uMnuz Vusi Khomo, uthe baziswe ngalezi zinguquko ngeposi kanti abanye abafundi abazitholanga kwazincwadi lezo.

“Abafundi abaqhamuka emakhaya bazobhekana nenkinga ngoba ezikoleni abafunda kuzo akukho ngisho amakhompyutha,” kusho uKhomo.

Bathi babona ukuthi belulungile uhlelo oludala futhi lusebenza kahle. Okunye abakhala ngakho wukuthi sebezothola ama-CD aqukethe uhla lwezincwadi okuzodingeka bazithenge.

“La ma-CD avulwa ngekhompyutha. Abangenawo amakhophyutha bazowavula kuphi ngoba kuzodingeka bakhiphe imali uma beyowavula kuma-internet café,” kubuza uKhomo.

Umqondisi walesi sikhungo, uMnuz Magnet Ntombela, uthe akanawo amandla okuthi avimbe lolu hlelo oluphakanyiswa yi-Unisa kuzwelonke lungasebenzi ezikhungweni zale nyuvesi eziseThekwini.

Uthe ngoLwesihlanu bathola uhlu lwezikhalazo luvela kubafundi lubazisa ngokungeneliseki ngezinguquko kodwa bangacacisa ukuthi bazobhikisha.