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“This was the most chaotic week I’ve seen on campus,” sighed a student, who identified herself only as Nelisiwe as she walked back to the Mafikeng campus of North-West University.
Rubble and burnt tyres were strewn at the main gate. Shops were looted, cafeterias were cleaned out and there were still unused petrol bombs in residences.
Overall damage on the campus has been estimated in the hundreds of thousands.
This was the aftermath of the week-long protest at the campus this week.
Among the looted stores were bookshops that also sold laptops, a printing shop and other stores in the student centre.
Management said some furniture was stolen from the university’s Great Hall, which had also been broken into. More than 40 students were arrested after engaging in running battles with the police, who used rubber bullets to try to control the rampaging mob.
Nelisiwe said: “This has really agitated students, but at the same time we had criminal elements coming in to take advantage of the situation. I am glad it is over now and we can write our exams.”
When students took over the campus, controlling access to the main gate, vice-chancellor Professor Dan Kgwadi decided to close it down. But some students defied him and returned the same day.
University spokesperson Louis Jacobs said students who had returned to campus were doing so “at their own risk”, as the university remained closed until tomorrow.
Exams were due to start tomorrow, too, but they have now been pushed out to November 16.
Some of the students who defied the closure and remained on campus could be seen preparing for exams inside the 24-hour study hall.
Benz Mabengwane, president of the students’ representative council, led a cleaning campaign with a number of students.
Mabengwane told City Press they had agreed to halt the protest “for now” but warned that unless their demands were met, similar chaos could erupt when the university opened for registration in 2016.
“The ball is in management’s court. We have put all our grievances on the table. We are not expecting them to send any student back home because they have an outstanding balance, do not have registration fees, or simply because NSFAS [the National Student Financial Aid Scheme] is unable to assist them,” said Mabengwane.
“We have agreed with management to postpone exams while we engage in a bid to resolve outstanding issues. We’re hoping for everything to be settled by the end of this year to avoid any drama next year, because the only language management understands is protest.”
The students joined the countrywide #FeesMustFall movement before the announcement of the freeze on fee increases brokered by President Jacob Zuma.
But Mabengwane said students at the Mafikeng campus were still unhappy about the poor state of their facilities compared with those on the Potchefstroom campus of the university.
“They are building an empire in Potchefstroom. Here in Mafikeng – which is mostly attended by previously disadvantaged students – they are selling university-owned properties outside campus that were meant for [student] accommodation. All this while students on this campus live in conditions worse than those in RDP houses,” he said.
“We demand here, as well, a fully equipped library and archive section of the same standard as the Potchefstroom campus, which also has a museum. We have more than 11 000 registered students in Mafikeng and also demand armed security officers on campus – just like in Potchefstroom – to prevent the ongoing armed robberies here,” he said.
Jacobs said management was busy with a strategic review process that would look into the “alignment of activities” across all campuses, including Potchefstroom, Mafikeng and the Vaal campus in Gauteng.
He denied that the Mafikeng campus had been short-changed when it came to infrastructure improvement, saying “millions” had been spent to upgrade Mafikeng since the merger in 2004.
