Xola Njengele, Chairperson of the SRC of Stellenbosch University, addressing students at a mass meeting on the Rooiplein regarding the status of financial exclusion, student debt and registration concerns at 13:00 on 16 March 2021. PHOTO: Maryam Adams.
Stellenbosch University (SU) is pursuing a process of “interim access” whereby 543 students known by the registrar’s office to have debt barring them from registration, will have that debt cleared.
This was announced by the Stellenbosch Student Representative Council (SRC) at a mass meeting on 16 March. Registration will be pushed to 26 March for all students, with no late registration fee to be imposed, stated Xola Njengele, SRC Chairperson.
The nationwide call for a shutdown of South Africa’s 26 universities issued by the South African Union of Students (SAUS) has been met with reluctance by SU’s SRC and SU’s spokesperson, Martin Viljoen.
“Issues raised by SU students have been addressed as far as possible and those issues which require government intervention will take longer to address, but it does not justify a shutdown,” commented Viljoen.
“There won’t be a shutdown at Stellenbosch,” Njengele told students during the 16 March meeting. “It is not a secret that it will be putting at risk majority black students, and as a black student myself, I can’t allow that,” said Njengele in regards to what mobilisation would mean at SU campus.
However, according to Zizo Vokwana, chairperson of the South African Students Congress Organization (SASCO) Stellenbosch, unregistered students are not satisfied with the way that the university has dealt with their financial situation. “We’ve accumulated debt because we are the poorest of the poor,” said Vokwana.
On the topic of solidarity, SAUS was definitive in its position on how Stellenbosch ought to engage.
“With regards to struggles in the higher education sector, Stellenbosch [University] is not immune to it,” said Lukhanyo Daweti, member of the national executive of SAUS. According to Daweti, “to ignore the struggle, would be the highest order of ignorance”.
Xola Njengele, Chairperson of the SRC of Stellenbosch University, taking questions from students on the Rooiplein. PHOTO: Maryam Adams.
Roseline Kolony poses a question to the SRC in response to their address. PHOTO: Maryam Adams.
Xola Njengele, Chairperson of the SRC of Stellenbosch University, taking questions from students on the Rooiplein. PHOTO: Maryam Adams.
VIDEO: Wessel Krige for MatieMedia
By Giuseppe Rajkumar Guerandi & Maryam Adams