Students want Jansen out as violence reigns

25 February 2016 - 02:47 By Jan Bornman, Shenaaz Jamal and Aron Hyman

The University of the Free State's Student Representative Council wants Jonathan Jansen to resign as rector. The university suspended classes after a group of students vowed revenge after a Monday night protest during a Varsity Cup rugby match ended with frustrated spectators assaulting them.On Tuesday protesting students vandalised a monument to CR Swart in front of the law faculty building.Police and security personnel patrolled the campus yesterday as the SRC leadership drew up a memorandum.Mpho Khati, the SRC's deputy president, said students were willing to hand the memorandum over to anyone on the university's senior management team - except Jansen."We don't recognise him any more," she said.The memorandum calls for:Jansen's resignation;The release without charge of students involved in Monday's fracas;The diversification of the university's residences; andThe fast-tracking of "decolonisation" at the university.The SRC's president, Lindokuhle Ntuli, said: "If the demands in this memorandum are not met, we will continue to shut down this campus."Violence also broke out at the University of North West's Mahikeng campus moments after the newly elected SRC was inaugurated. Students opposed to the new SRC protested on the campus and a violent clash ensued. Private security officers and the police were called onto the campus, and rubber bullets and teargas were used to disperse the protesters.A dispatcher for Mahikeng emergency services said three fire engines were dispatched to the university.At the University of Cape Town, faeces were strewn on the floors of five buildings. Vice-chancellor Max Price called the action "an affront to our shared humanity".Price's offices were petrol-bombed last week.Yesterday a silent protest was staged by the Black Academic Caucus movement in front of the main stairway at the UCT campus...

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