CPUT students plan to continue protesting against tuition fees and intend submitting a memorandum of demands on Thursday.
|||Students at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology continued protesting against tuition fees today and intend submitting a memorandum of demands tomorrow.
Yesterday four police vehicles were sent to the campus when more than 100 students forced the university’s registration centre to close.
One person, who was admitted to hospital yesterday after being pepper-sprayed, said she was furious about what had happened.
Judy Bikani, 22, had come from Worcester and was hoping to register for a degree in public management. She was not one of the protesters.
“The strikers were just singing, and the security guards just sprayed pepper spray,” she said.
“How can they spray pepper when there are people sitting right there who are not striking? Do they not care about the rest of us?” asked Bikani.
Several students were affected. Bikani collapsed and was taken to Christiaan Barnard Memorial Hospital.
Thamsanqa Nkwanyane, spokesman for CPUT, said student protesters had disrupted a welcoming ceremony for first-years.
“To disperse them, pepper spray was used and unfortunately one student was affected,” said Nkwanyane.
This morning about 30 students protested again.
Security guards pepper-sprayed the inside of the main administration building to force students to leave, but there were no other incidents at the time of going to press.
While the chaos unfolded yesterday, Monwabisi Luthuli, the SA Students’ Congress (Sasco) provincial secretary, assured journalists that the protest was a peaceful one.
“Vandalism cripples our purpose. Our members must exercise restraint because we’ll be using those facilities the next day.”
Luthuli said the “indefinite” strike would affect all CPUT campuses.
He added that R5 000 forresidential students, and R3 400 for Oppidan students (those not living in residence) were absurd registration fees.
Luthuli accused the university of mismanagement and said students affiliated to Sasco rejected the rumoured 12 percent increase in tuition fees for this year.
“If the average South African household is not even earning R2 500 a month, you can’t say R5 000 (for registration) is reasonable.”
He said the organisation was willing to negotiate with the university, but would not accept anything higher than a R2 500 registration fee for students living off-campus.
Nkwanyane said CPUT consulted the student leadership in April and explained reasons for the increases.
But Luthuli said student representatives found out about the fee increase only in November.
“Only two representatives from the newly elected SRC attended that meeting. They were only allowed to participate as observers, and were unable to influence decision- making,” he said.
The university confirmed that, as observers, the two students did not have a vote at the meeting, but said it found Luthuli’s claims “strange”.
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The chair of council gave them ample opportunity to state their position and contribute to the discussion.
“There was ongoing consultation with student leadership about fees, which commenced in the first semester in 2011,” said Nkwanyane.
Despite his concern about the delay the strike would cause, Luthuli said it would continue “until further notice”.
“We are not concerned about suspension. Suspensions are part of the revolution. Many people have been suspended for revolutionary calls. It is no problem to lose education, having created access for others,” said Luthuli.
Sasco would submit the memorandum to the university’s council chairperson tomorrow.
sibongakonke.mama@inl.co.za - Cape Argus