YCLSA Press Alert April 10, 2013 Student protest rally with Zwelinzima Vavi, Alex Mashilo & others
The Young Communist League of South Africa [uFasimba] supports the protest rally by the Wits SRC, calling on Wits University management to drop charges against student protesters. Media are hereby invited to attend and report: DATE: Friday, 10 May 2013 TIME: 15h30 VENUE: Wits University Great Hall, East Campus, Wits University, Johannesburg SPEAKERS: COSATU General-Secretary Zwelinzima Vavi, YCLSA Deputy National Secretary Alex Mashilo, NEHAWU 1st President Joe Mpisi and others. CONTACT: 071 115 4619 The Wits SRC, the Progressive Youth Alliance (PYA) and peace loving people are coming together tomorrow to reaffirm our commitment to freedom of expression and the right to protest as part of what forms our constitutional basis for democracy; we therefore call for all charges against the students to be dropped with immediate effect by the Wits University Management. On the 12th of March 2013 students, led by the Wits SRC and numerous other student organisations, engaged in a non-violent protest action against an Israeli Embassy funded piano concert at Wits University. Prior to this, the Wits SRC had sent several communications and tried to engage with all relevant Wits authorities on the matter in an attempt to resolve the issue and have the Israeli Embassy concert cancelled. These communications were consistently ignored by the Wits University Management. The Wits SRC strongly maintains that the Israeli Embassy funded piano concert was in direct violation of the cultural and academic boycott of Israel, a standing resolution of the Wits SRC and a global call from Palestinian civil society since 2005. Following the protest action on the 12th of March, 11 students have been charged for misconduct by Wits University. The counts of misconduct include absurd charges of ‘singing and/or chanting and/or stomping your feet’. Wits University prides itself on its history as one of the most liberal institutions that fought for access to education for all races during apartheid. Non-violent protest action was a key feature in the international and local struggle against apartheid South Africa. Protest action is a course of last resort to voice dissent and is by its very nature, intended to be disruptive. Charging students for protest suggests intolerance to students as equal players in developing, challenging and/or championing views. We must be led to conclude that the Wits University Management would rather have an apathetic student population that never challenges its authority. YCL statement calling on Wits University management to drop the charges against the students, and not bend to the Israel lobby: (http://tinyurl.com/c876mlj) Sent from my iPhone -- -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] . --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "YCLSA Discussion Forum" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
