The youth run amok intent on dealing out their form of own justice.
RECENT events once again demonstrate the youth’s conviction that mob action is the best way to express grievances and demand ”justice”.
The past lives on: Numerous incidents of students running riot in the name of ”justice” suggest that this generation has more faith in the results of mob action than in democratic structures or the law.
Horrific incidents continue to plague schools, last month in Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal. In one of the worst incidents, three people lost their lives at Imbeka Secondary school in Inanda, KwaZulu-Natal. Provincial education department representative Mandla Msibi explained that a fight involving two men and a teacher — apparently in connection with a love affair — began off the school premises. However, the teacher was on the school grounds when she was shot and wounded by one of the men. The pupils responded by stoning the two men to death and burning their car.
While Msibi says the department does not condone this ”jungle justice”, he says ”We can’t say we’re going to take action against the students”. His explanation for why the students acted in such a bloodthirsty way is, ”It’s clear that the children thought they wouldn’t get justice [against the men]. They don’t trust the police.”
Winile Secondary school in Zonkizizwe on the East Rand in Gauteng was the scene of another ”love triangle” murder last month, when teacher Ronald Sibuyi was murdered, reportedly by his girlfriend’s former boyfriend, on the school grounds. Once again, students did not stand back and wait for the law enforcement agency to do their job: about 1 000 of them marched to the nearby primary school, intending to find a teacher there who allegedly knew the murderer. Police, who were forewarned and evacuated the female teacher, were met by a mass of stone-throwing pupils who demanded that the woman be handed over to them. Two policeman and several students were injured in the clash. Consequently, many students are staying away from school fearing they will face charges of attempted murder and malicious damage to property.
This was the second time in as many days that East Rand pupils have embraced lawlessness as a means of achieving ”justice”. The first incident followed the tragic suicide of learner Christopher Tshabalala (22), who hanged himself with a kettle cord. Tshabalala lived in a cottage on the school’s ground with his father, who is the caretaker for the school.
Believing the father to be responsible for Tshabalala’s death because of a history of abuse, hundreds of angry students went on a manhunt. While the man escaped, the cottage was burnt to the ground and two cars torched. Students then threw stones at the emergency vehicles to prevent them from coming on to the school grounds.
Two other incidents in Gauteng also illustrate the manifest frustration of the youth with levels of crime and a perception that law enforcement agencies don’t do their job. A group of students from Reasoma High school reacted to the shooting of one of their peers — allegedly by two pupils from another Soweto high school who stole his cellphone — by threatening to burn down the home of the grandfather of one of the alleged criminals. And in Mamelodi West near Pretoria, things turned ugly when about 500 students tried to hunt down a man who allegedly assaulted one of their classmates. The man was not at his house when the students arrived.
The sheer number of incidents where students respond to violence with further violence suggests a pattern that is fundamentally at odds with the practices and spirit of democracy. What seems to be key is persuading the youth that the democratic structures that exist — both within and outside schools –are both legitimate and effective. Paul Johnson, representative of the National Youth Commission, believes part of the reason for the student action is that students are still familiarising themselves with such structures, and that ”democracy education needs to become an embedded part of the school curriculum. This is one of the key recommendations of the national youth policy as applied to the education sector”, says Johnson.
And it’s not only students who need guidance in making democratic forums effective in solving differences. Johnson points out that ”student frustration sometimes gets institutionally encouraged”: obstructive behaviour by school authorities can have the effect of alienating students from the preferred channels of expressing grievances and set them running wild instead.
Besides our particular South African legacy of struggle and mass action, Johson also believes that the ”fashionability of violence” contributes to the prevalence of such behaviour. ”Popular culture at the moment has violence at the heart of its appeal”, says Johnson, pointing out ”links between gangsta rap and what’s happening in our schools”.
— The Teacher/Mail & Guardian, September 5, 2000.
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