Paper-ball student protest

Press, 1 June 1985, Page 10

Paper-ball student protest

NZPA-AP Johannesburg Demonstrators marched and chanted on a campus at Johannesburg yesterday in a rare student protest against apartheid. Security police watched and took pictures. The five-hour protest, although tame by the standard of demonstrations on European and American campuses, provided a glimpse of student activism in South Africa. For some students at the mixed-race University of the Witwatersrand, yesterday was “Anti-Republic Day.” This is when blacks protest against white-minor-ity rule on the eve of the May 31 holiday marking the creation of the Republic of South Africa in 1961. Two black groups, the Azanian Students Organisation, or A.Z.A.5.0., and the Black Students’ Society, attracted about 500 colleagues, whites and blacks, to a grassy common for speeches, poetry, and freedom songs.

Security police watched and took pictures and thousands of other students simply ignored the demonstrators. Classes and the libraries were full and the music of the American rock star, Bruce Springsteen, thumped from the crowded Student Union. Chanting and dancing, the demonstrators marched through the campus, ending their parade at a display table around which stood a half-dozen determined-look-ing young white men. This was the information centre of the Student Moderate Alliance, a five-year-old organisation that amazes observers by publishing volumes of glossy, pro-Govemment pamphlets while boasting a mere 467 members. Some say that the governing National Party funds the S.M.A. to balance off the rest of the nation’s student bodies, most of which want apartheid dismantled. “We’re not for any particular party,” insisted

S.M.A.’s president, Glen Kruger, as the demonstrators closed in around his table. Campus guards, who are black, rushed in with a pair of dogs to keep the groups apart. Insults and a few obscene gestures were exchanged before the sides started heaving paper balls at one another. The campus security manager, Mr C. J. Hurst, shouted at the two sides to end the confrontation. “Not until the flags come down,” said a former A.Z.A.S.O. president, Tiatiego Moneseki. The protesters wanted the S.M.A. to bring down the four South, African flags that were waving above the S.M.A. table. “No way,” said Mr Kruger. “Then we won’t leave,” said Mr Tiatiego. More paper wads flew. One of the demonstrators heaved an empty soda can. An S.M.A. man scuffled with a black. Mr Hurst sent out for four more dogs.

The deal that was finally struck had the protesters moving back a little at a time as the S.M.A. dismantled its table. “The flags don’t come down until those guys are all the way back on the grass,” Mr Kruger protested. “Don’t dare wave them,” responded Mr Tiatiego. The S.M.A. never dropped its flags, electing to defiantly cart them off at full staff. The protesters cheered and sang. Both sides declared victory. The student council’s president who had joined the anti-apartheid march, acknowledged that the protest was tame. “It’s fear,” he said. “Students know that security in this country means police using live ammunition. They aren’t about to jump into something that they know they are going to lose. The presence of those flags infuriates people who have no say in running South Africa.”