Students at the University of KwaZulu-Natal’s (UKZN) medical school believe they are racially victimised while staff counter that personality clashes and academic rigour are being misconstrued as racism.
Over the past three years escalating racial tension at the Nelson R Mandela School of Medicine has seen black students alleging racial discrimination by Indian academics in the teaching and assessments of students; the humiliation, belittling and ridiculing of African students during intakes and tutorials; various instances of preferential treatment given to Indian students; and the general lack of an environment conducive to African students reporting issues of concern to them without fear of recrimination, among others.
A confidential external forensic audit by Deloitte, which the Mail & Guardian has in its possession, concluded last year that while “some allegations appear to be completely without substance, the environment at the [medical school] clearly lends itself to allegations of racial prejudice easily being made”. It added that “small incidents, which appear to be nothing more substantial than personal differences, or wrong perceptions, or misunderstandings, easily evolve to alleged racial prejudice in the [school] environment.”
A sixth-year medical student who chose to remain anonymous told the M&G that she had experienced racism by lecturers during her time at the university but felt the issue had reached the stage where “now everything can be construed as racism. Even if a lecturer says ‘rubbish’ to a student, which teachers do, people will consider it as racist because things haven’t been resolved for such a long time.”
The student felt that there were people “jumping on the racism bandwagon to pass” but that incidents of actual racism did exist.
The Deloitte report suggested weak leadership has led to the school’s inability to resolve racial issues and create cultural harmony, and that the school’s attempts at transformation of its staff and student body — which some academics at the medical school believe is suffering from ill thought-out and haphazard directives by the UKZN’s increasingly centralised senior management — is in turmoil.
The report found that from 1999 to 2004 the school had failed to reach its target of a 69% African student intake while the corresponding Indian intake was abnormally high relative to proportional racial representation of the province.
In April this year the dean of the school, Professor Girish Mody, resigned citing ” a change in personal circumstances”; while a month earlier students had embarked on a course of industrial action to motivate university management to act on the findings of the Deloitte report. Eleven lecturers and one retired academic appeared before disciplinary hearings that have not yet been completed. The findings should be released in August, said Professor Leana Uys, head of the health sciences college.
A medical school academic who chose to remain anonymous said as an Indian who previously studied at the medical school, his experience had “humanised and conscientised” him to the political and social reality of South Africa during apartheid and that allegations of racism against many of the staff who had come from a similar background were spurious.
He added that the manner in which the events have been played out in the local media pointed to an “Africanist orchestration … Where is this intrigue coming from?”
Another high-ranking source at the medical school said: “One is not really sure if there is a political agenda or if it is simple naivetÃ