An attack on student activism is an attack on our democracy

Universities remain one of the most unequal and untransformed spaces in South Africa.

One may argue that the country itself is one of the world’s youngest democracies and faces many of the challenges that new democratic states face.

After all, the apartheid regime was “demolished” just over five quinquennials ago.

However, one may also argue that after 27 years the country should not be facing the same challenges it was facing at the dawn of democracy.

One of the most urgent issues that South Africa is facing is the failure to invest in active youth empowerment in order to enable young people to be active citizens who may tackle our country’s wide array of issues.

This is characterised by the attack of active citizenship by student activists at South African universities.

At most institutions throughout the country, university management has criminalised activism so as to easily get away with the failed project of transformation and social injustice.

The last seven years and a half have been defined by mass protests of the ongoing #FeesMustFall movement.

As we may all know, the #FeesMustFall movement is a student-led protest movement which began in 2015.

This saw a massive eruption of protests at universities across the country in a movement that redefined politics in post-apartheid South Africa and presented the evidence of a “born-free” generation telling their own story and leading discourse as well as action on transforming South Africa through the quest of free and accessible education.

After seven years, the concerns of the first #FeesMustFall generation of students are still very visible in society.

Although relative accessibility has increased due to a slight boost in public and private sector funding, many issues such as accessible, safe and secure student accommodation, food insecurity on campuses, decolonised university curricula and first-generation entry into universities still remain present.

But why has the #FeesMustFall movement lost momentum over the years?

Universities in South Africa as well as the government successfully quashed the movement by harassing and victimising student leaders and activists.

A 2019 investigation report by the Independent Police Investigative Directorate revealed that over 33 million South African rand was spent spying on #FeesMustFall activists during the 2016-17 academic calendars.

Many student activists also attested to their phones being tapped and their places of residence and those of their loved ones being put under surveillance during the period.

In order to win the fight against the #FeesMustFall movement, universities such as the University of the Free State (UFS) adopted strategies to intimidate and victimise student leaders.

In this way, they were actively infringing upon the right to protest which is enshrined in Section 17 of the Constitution, which states: “Everyone has the right, peacefully and unarmed, to assemble, to demonstrate, to picket and to present petitions.”

This is to be done peacefully and without weapons.

On March 30, 2022, UFS vice chancellor Professor Francis Petersen wrote an article titled ‘When a protest is not a protest but a crime’.

In the article, Petersen narrates the challenges faced by South African universities while strongly condemning student protests on the UFS and University of Kwazulu-Natal campuses.

On the surface level, it may seem as if this article is a genuine expression of concern about issues faced by universities throughout the country.

Unfortunately, for many student activists and student leaders, the article in subject is a manifestation of the continued attack on student activism and the victimisation of student activists at South African universities.

This article serves to outline the strategic and organised syndicate by the “old guard” collective, which seeks to crush student activism on all fronts on its campuses in order to replace it with prefect-like anointed leadership in student representation.

This collective includes government and university officials in different capacities.

They have used and are using different tools and tactics to quell activism on campuses.

As part of the fourth generation of #FeesMustFall activists, I have seen first-hand the unfair university managements’ response during peaceful demonstrations and protests at the UFS campus.

Private security companies are hired and they brutalise students engaging in peaceful protests.

It is needless to say that most universities face the same issues every year.

While we may attest that some of the issues leading to protests are sector challenges that have little to do with registration, most of the issues are operational challenges that are created by universities themselves in light of incompetence.

Issues such as on-campus and off-campus accommodation for students have been prominent during registration periods.

The UFS itself has only 5 790 beds on the Bloemfontein campus while it has over 32 000 students enrolled.

Very little has been done to fix this matter.

Accreditation of off-campus student accommodation has also been failing at the UFS for over three years.

Other issues such as verification of funding of students between the financial aid office and the finance office are always prominent every year and affect predominantly disadvantaged students.

These operational issues could easily be solved through consultative dialogue with activists and student leaders to find sustainable and efficient models.

But, no!

Universities continue to criminalise activism and harass student leaders.

The UFS has guidelines to operationalise the right to protest.

According to the said guidelines, “the UFS is committed to not only protecting or tolerating, but also enabling and indeed fostering protest.”

Yet, in 2021, the UFS took out a court interdict to ensure that student activists, including those affiliated to the South African Students Congress (SASCO), EFF Student Command and even the Student Representative Council (SRC) could not carry out their fundamental purpose of representing students views and protecting their interests.

Twenty-four students were arrested at a protest on campus and spent time in prison.

Although the university withdrew the charges in February 2022, the intention was not to serve justice against criminals, but to intimidate and victimise students and their leaders into silence.

On February 23, 13 student activists including myself were arrested at a peaceful demonstration regarding late allocation of students’ allowances.

We spent multiple days in holding.

Contrary to what Petersen claims, the situation on South African university campuses is not a situation of criminality.

It is a result of the old-guard tactics that have made it difficult for organised activism to continue, leaving students and their leaders with no option except adopting guerrilla activism for their voices to be heard.

Such tactics should be seen as nothing more than institutionalised vigilantism that seeks to undermine the highest law in the land through legal means.

Although Section 35 of the Higher Education Act, No. 101 of 1997, as amended, compels all institutions of public higher education in South Africa to have SRCs as part of their governing structures, they do not compel universities to have capacitated and conscious representatives of students.

For this reason, universities in South Africa are attacking and quelling all forms of organised activism in order for the SRC to be merely a box to tick on their campuses.

In this way, they can do as they please with the lives and future of students, with no capacitated student activists to keep them accountable or ensure sustainable transformation.

These efforts by universities are part of their fight against the #FeesMustFall movement, which continues to this day in many forms and shapes.

Stances such as those of Petersen are a danger to society because they threaten the fundamental principles upon which our democracy is built.

Such views threaten free speech, the right to education, expression and organised protest.

There is no question that student movements have played an important role in South Africa’s path to and development as a democracy throughout the years.

Organisations such as NUSAS, SASO and SASCO ensured that South Africa’s gross apartheid policies were kept on the agenda in international advocacy spaces.

In addition to this, the #FeesMustFall movement ensured that relative access to higher education is not only for the rich and privileged in South Africa.

In conclusion, institutions of higher learning that criminalise activism directly render freedom and democracy immaterial.

If solutions to the country’s sector problems in higher education are to be found, it will be through collaborative and sustainable engagements with stakeholders in the sector alongside student activists and leaders.

Any other means that claim to be putting forward solutions by criminalising the expression of those issues are mere criminality.

• Siphilangenkosi Dlamini is an undergraduate student in political governance and transformation at the University of the Free State. A student activist and researcher, he is also the author of the book ‘Magic and Other Authentic Experiences’.