Amid uproar at South Africa’s universities, evidence of state manipulation emerges
Ann Eveleth
MINUTES of a secret meeting allegedly between Education Minister Sibusiso Bengu, University of Durban-Westville (UDW)council members and high-flying Durban attorney Linda Zama suggest a clear political agenda lies behind an ongoing probe into campus conflict.
Attorneys acting for UDW’s Combined Staff Association (Comsa) wrote to President Nelson Mandela’s office this week demanding a presidential commission of inquiry appointed last year to investigate long- standing conflict at the institution be immediately disbanded. Comsa attorney Jay Surju attached minutes of an October 1996 meeting between Bengu, “certain unidentified members of the council” and Zama, a member of the commission.
The minutes suggest Bengu and Zama wanted to use problems on the campus as a justification for ministerial involvement in appointing a new vice chancellor. “The gloomy picture at UDW presents opportunities,” the minutes quote Bengu saying.
Bengu’s spokesman Lincoln Mali could not confirm the contents of the documents and Zama declined to comment. Surju’s letter claims the authenticity of the minutes has been “verified and confirmed”.
Surju also notified Mandela of Comsa’s intention to approach the Durban Supreme Court “for appropriate relief” with respect to Zama’s conduct in the meeting. Zama is quoted in the minutes as saying “Comsa is not a union as it claims to be. It is a vehicle to achieve certain goals … Comsa’s agenda is to prevent transformation, by appealing to race. The union holds the institution at ransom”.
Surju says these comments justify earlier Comsa concerns regarding Zama’s impartiality following her appointment to the commission in May 1996. Comsa and the UDW Student’s Representative Council (SRC) opposed the formation of the commission, and demanded a commission of inquiry to ensure greater impartiality.
SRC spokesman Busani Ngcaweni said a mass student meeting on Wednesday resolved to approach the Durban Supreme Court for relief from subpeonas issued to some student leaders by the commission: “The document now in our possession shows the partiality of the commission and justifies our reservations. This document will be circulated to every person on campus next week so they will know what happened last year,” he said.
Surju argues the contents of the minutes “are capable of no other interpretation but that the minister of education, Zama, and certain members of the council are collaborating and colluding in order to implement a political agenda and strategy through the vehicle of the commission by manipulating the contents of the reports to be presented to the commission in such a manner as to support their political agenda and strategy”.
The minutes record Zama as saying: “There are sinister forces that are operating [and this] may mean that part of the solution will have to focus on the need for an intelligence network.”
Surju argues the minutes also provide “distressing and irrefutable evidence that the failure to appoint Professor Itumeleng Mosala was politically orchestrated”. Mosala was the favoured candidate of various campus constituencies including Comsa and SRC for appointment as university vice-rector, but his application was rejected by the university council.
The minutes quote Bengu as saying: “The non-appointment of Mosala was a success.”
The minutes also suggest a wider attempt to gain political control of the university, with council quoted saying: “An active senior management in 1995 was a recipe for disaster … The alliance between the SRC and Comsa proved to be the most lethal part of the crisis. UDW is in a fluid situation which has many factors that can be exploited to restore balance.” Council refers to the formation of a rival staff association last year as “an important new feeling among staff” and notes that “sanity is now being restored” with respect to Sasco’s position on campus.
Both Zama and council are recorded commenting on the need for “intelligence” work on campus, with council adding that: “Given the situation of this province, we need to not lose this campus.” The discussion turned to contents of the commission’s report and the possibilities forl ministerial intervention. Council asked Bengu whether the appointment of the still-awaited new vice-rector was “going to be a ministerial appointment”.
Bengu responded that: “When the management of the institution gets to the point of being demobilised, then ministerial intervention will be possible with express Council agreement”.
Council then replied that it (council) “needs to protect the minister politically,and therefore it is important not for him to be seen to be intervening unneccessarily, thereby being taken to court (ultra-vires) as was the case with the Minister De Klerk … The gloomier the report is, the better, so we can realise the severity of the situation.”
Surju argues this conduct by the meeting participants “unlawful and contrary to the express terms of reference and regulations of the commission of inquiry itself” and that there is “no proper or lawful basis for the commission continuing to purport to be `impartially’ investigating the situation at UDW”.