With protesting students and police lines drawn, the big question remains: Is this history in the making or another democratic sideshow? Is this our Arab Spring or just a lazy, hot summer?

Students across the country have called for a halt to university tariff increases, with many claiming they can no longer afford to stay in university.

The price hikes are a whopping 10% above inflation and with national government reducing its yearly university grant in aid, the costs now have to be carried by students.

10 years ago, 49% of the actual cost of university courses were covered by the government – now it is only 40%.

The so-called Arab Spring was a revolutionary wave of demonstrations and protests (both non-violent and violent), riots and civil wars in the Arab world that began on December 18, 2010, in Tunisia with the Tunisian Revolution, and spread throughout the countries of the Arab League and its surroundings. Still part of the so-called Arab Spring is the conflict in Syria, which is still ongoing.

Can we really be expected to believe that the #FeesMustFall is the start of such massive change in South Africa?

Has the #FeesMustFall become a rallying cry of the oppressed, as some Facebook readers would have you believe?

Or a sad joke the ANC found itself in, protesting against it’s self?

Read and watch what South African students, some possibly even from Ladysmith, have to say in our sister newspaper, the North East Tribune

Read our editorial post HERE

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