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<h1>College in bid to block violent protests</h1>
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September 2 2015 at 07:47am <br>
By Gadeeja Abbas
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<span class="">YOUTUBE</span>
<span class="">Violent scenes were captured on cellphone video footage uploaded by AfriForum Youth.</span>
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<p>Cape Town - Violent protests at the Elsenburg Agricultural Training
Institute in Stellenbosch has forced the college to seek an interdict to
“block any future illegal protests”. </p>
<p>The institute also brought in extra security after two days of
protest action – against language policies – threatened to further
disrupt classes. </p>
<p>Public order police were called in in an attempt to calm tensions. </p>
<p>A group of Economic Freedom Fighters Students Command (EFFSC) members
and students protested since Monday against what they called “racist”
language policies that “enforced” Afrikaans as a medium of instruction. </p>
<p>The institute is registered with the Western Cape Department of
Agriculture and currently has a 50/50 language policy. This means that
half of the classes are taught in English and the other half in
Afrikaans. </p>
<p> </p>
<p>The EFFSC said language policies at universities isolated the
majority of black students not familiar with Afrikaans, and called for
“radical transformation”. </p>
<p>They added that students had approached management and other
stakeholders on the issues but had not received any assistance to remedy
the situation. </p>
<p>“The racism in predominantly white institutions like the University
of Cape Town, Wits University, the University of Pretoria, Rhodes
University and the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University is
suffocating; black students at these universities have all declared
enough is enough. They have decided to face white supremacy and those
racist institutions head on through radical campaigns,” they added. </p>
<p>Classes were officially suspended when language policy protesters
assaulted non-protesting students with sjamboks as they barged into a
campus lecture hall to disrupt classes. </p>
<p>The violent scenes were captured on cellphone video footage uploaded by AfriForum Youth on Tuesday. </p>
<p>The rights group also said it would hire its own security guards and
would also consider taking action against police for “failing to enforce
order”. </p>
<p>Elsenburg’s council management and the Student Representative Council met on Tuesday to discuss a course of action. </p>
<p>The institute’s spokeswoman, Petro van Rhyn, said the issues raised
by students during a meeting were taken seriously and were being dealt
with. </p>
<p>“The behaviour of some of the students and other outside parties has
not created a conducive environment for finding solutions. We call for
cool heads and ask that we all work together to resolve this issue,” she
said. </p>
<p>A task team has been established to engage with stakeholders to facilitate the development of a new language policy. </p>
<p>“Independent mediators have been appointed to facilitate the
transformation process, diversity management training and conflict
resolution involving students, lecturers and administrative personnel,”
Van Rhyn said. </p>
<p>As a result of that meeting, it was decided that lectures would be doubled up and delivered in English and Afrikaans. </p>
<p>However, this solution was slammed by Western Cape Economic Opportunities MEC Alan Winde, who also condemned the violence. </p>
<p>Winde said he could not allow students to be split “along racial lines” and be educated separately. </p>
<p>“I do not want to have black classes and white classes, it is not
going to happen here,” he said. Winde also warned that “politics” should
not feature, as such “interference” only “fuels the fire”. </p>
<p>The DA also condemned Tuesday’s violence at Elsenburg, saying: “The
DA believes in an open academic environment in which students have the
opportunity to exceed academically.” </p>
<p>The Department of Agriculture sent a letter addressed to parents and
students at the college raising the issue of language, saying that
despite “progress made towards developing an inclusive approach to
learning”, there remained a group of students that appeared opposed to
finding solutions. </p>
<a href="mailto:gadeeja.abbas@inl.co.za">gadeeja.abbas@inl.co.za</a><br><br><a href="http://www.iol.co.za/news/crime-courts/college-in-bid-to-block-violent-protests-1.1909194#.VecVo5eU2-c">http://www.iol.co.za/news/crime-courts/college-in-bid-to-block-violent-protests-1.1909194#.VecVo5eU2-c</a><br>-- <br><div class="gmail_signature">**************************************<br>N.b.: Listing on the lgpolicy-list is merely intended as a service to its members<br>and implies neither approval, confirmation nor agreement by the owner or sponsor of the list as to the veracity of a message's contents. Members who disagree with a message are encouraged to post a rebuttal, and to write directly to the original sender of any offensive message. A copy of this may be forwarded to this list as well. (H. Schiffman, Moderator)<br><br>For more information about the lgpolicy-list, go to <a href="https://groups.sas.upenn.edu/mailman/" target="_blank">https://groups.sas.upenn.edu/mailman/</a><br>listinfo/lgpolicy-list<br>*******************************************</div>
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