At the beginning of 2005, when the new North-West University had become a legal entity, most of the staff of the former Vista University’s Sebokeng campus had migrated to the Vaal Pukke, which had become the Vaal Triangle campus of the new institution — although some die-hard conservatives still refer to it by its old name.
But before this, my differences with student representatives led to an incident in August 2004, after I had attended a meeting at the Vaal Triangle Campus while a student summit was going on at Sebokeng. On my return to the Sebokeng campus I learned the summit had concluded that the September 1 deadline for the payment of all outstanding student fees must be postponed indefinitely.
As I drove towards the campus, I noticed that the students were picketing at the gate and chanting protest songs. They had barricaded the gates. I slowed down as I advanced towards them. They closed in on my car waving banners, which in that state I could not read. They besieged the vehicle and I came to a standstill.
They banged their fists on the windscreen, side windows, bonnet and boot. One of them climbed onto the bonnet of the car and danced the toyi-toyi.
Despite what looked like chaos and the threat of violence to my person, I knew deep down in my heart that the Vista students would not dare do anything untoward. But what put me in a state of panic was when I realised that among them were students of the Vaal University of Technology. For the first time I was stricken with fear that if anyone broke a window or made a silly mistake, I would have had it.
I reversed the car slowly and they followed me, like a host of flies following a half-dead carcass. It was nothing like Victor Hugo’s student uprising and barricades in Les Misérables, but it was unnerving nevertheless. At some point, the magnetic force of the vehicle released them and I was able to make a U-turn and drive away from the gate.
I then pulled out my phone and rang campus reception, which arranged with security to open the back gate for me. This was done and I drove into the campus half an hour later. I parked the car and walked to the office. As they saw me the students advanced, singing and shouting. Some of their leaders held their hands high to stop them from coming too close to me. They gave me right of way and I entered the office, with a handful of them following closely on my heels.
I let them in and about eight squeezed into the office — one of them the student who had danced on the bonnet of my car. I told them that I would not have him in the meeting and asked him to leave. The students settled down. Some of them sat on chairs and others leaned against the wall.
Their first point of concern was the September deadline for outstanding fees. I realised that this was their major problem; other matters concerning migration to the Vaal Triangle campus were secondary. As soon as we had thrashed out that one, they agreed to disband the alfresco singing, which was getting rowdier. We closed that day with an agreement that I would invite their parents to come in and make arrangements to settle their debts. Every case would be handled on its merits.
The following week the Vaal Weekly published an article about the event with the headline, “Toyi-toying students ransacked Vista and threw rubble”. There was a photo of my car besieged on the front and sides by students.
What tickled me to laughter was the opening paragraph: “The rector of the former Vista University in Sebokeng, Professor Nhlanhla Maake, last week took to his heels and fled the potentially explosive scene [when] students protested against the allocation of NSFAS loans, littered the campus and threatened to intensify their actions should their grievance not be addressed.”
Professor Nhlanhla Maake is dean of humanities at Limpopo University. This is an edited extract from his book Barbarism in Higher Education: Once Upon a Time in a University, published in January