WSU campus remains closed as dispute continues

Walter Sisulu University’s Ibika campus in Butterworth remained closed yesterday amid allegations by students that management had reneged on binding resolutions.

University management failed in an attempt to find solutions to reopen the Ibika campus when they met with student formations last Thursday.

WSU plans to resume lectures next Monday, while registration is set to be finalised on Friday this week.

WSU spokeswoman Yonela Tukwayo said: “WSU management has tried on a number of occasions to constitute the SRC but the student political structures have been in disagreement despite court order to constitute .”

Tukwayo said the campus would be reopened once all parties reached agreement on the resolutions.

In a statement on the WSU social network site, interim vice-chancellor Khaya Mfenyana said management had failed to convince student leaders to try reach consensus before independent mediators.

Political formations at the university, which include the South African Students’ Congress (Sasco), Pan-Africanist Student Movement (Pasma) and Student Christian Congress, are at loggerheads over the allocation of seats following SRC elections last year.

Mfenyana said a proposal that an ad hoc committee represent Butterworth students in the meantime was also rejected. The Dispatch has learnt Sasco rejected that proposal.

Sasco deployee Luyanda Tenge confirmed they had disagreed with management on the ad hoc committee, saying it would not resolve the problem. “The same student delegation that represented the students would have sat in the same committee. We are advocating for the court order to be implemented.”

Sasco went to court to challenge the allocation of seats. The court ruled that the SRC be constituted, but other groups feared this would increase Sasco’s power on campus.

Tenge said the SRC dispute was not at the centre of disagreement that led to the campus not opening, as management previously stated.

Demands that were at the centre of shutting down the campus included:

lIncreasing the quota for the student intake this year;

lAllowing students in debt to receive academic records; and

lDetailing plans on how long-term debt was going to be settled by the government, so that returning students were not disadvantaged when registering.

Tenge said parties agreed on these matters, and that other issues, which included outsourcing, maintenance of residences and a shortage of residences, would be dealt with when the campus had reopened.

“However, we have not received the resolutions from management with the VC committing himself. We will only go back when that communication has been received,” he said.

Pasma deployee Ayanda Makhabane said students would return to the campus when they received management’s “communication”.

“It was Sasco that raised that item of the SRC in that meeting last week...it was only about the memo relating to other student issues, but they had to raise it,” Makhabane said. “We didn’t because we understood that we will disagree, and we did. They did not accept the proposal made by management.”