Tuks on tinderbox over Afrikaans
Threats of 'drastic steps' made should Tuks not drop the Afrikaans language as a medium of tuition soon.
A storm is brewing at Tuks over the issue of language with one side threatening “drastic steps” should Afrikaans not be shoved quickly aside and the other side vowing to save their mother tongue.
However, a draft language policy document indicates clearly that the days of Afrikaans as a language of tuition at the University of Pretoria (UP) are counted.
But, should this draft document be accepted, the language policy of the university will be challenged in court.
The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) at UP on Thursday, said it had had enough of administrators dragging their feet on the matter of ridding Tuks not only of the Afrikaans language, but also of the Afrikaans culture at the learning institution.
According to EFF at Tuks spokesperson Lungile Sonwabo, nothing or nobody would stop the party from taking “drastic steps”.
Students who support the #AfrikaansMustFall movement on Wednesday, painted several slogans on the walls at the university, including “White Privilege Must Fall”.
On the other side, AfriForum Tuks said that if staff, alumni and students did not quickly stand up for Afrikaans at the university, the language would disappear.
The statement followed after AfriForum Tuks withdrew from the university’s language policy working groups.
“We [AfriForum] had no choice to distance ourselves from the devious actions of these working groups,” said AfriForum Tuks spokesperson, Henrico Barnard.
He said this as a result of the release of a recent draft proposal by the working groups that supported only an English language policy.
EFF Tuks and the Democratic Alliance (DA) on campus had also already withdrawn from the working groups.
“After their withdrawal, AfriForum Tuks attempted without success, to positively influence the process.
“We made inputs to find a solution which would accommodate all students, but our rights and needs were not taken into consideration at all,” Barnard said, adding that since their withdrawal, no registered student organisation was any longer involved in the working groups.
With more than 13 000 students, the Afrikaans student community was the single largest language group at Tuks, Barnard said, adding that despite this fact, it had been recommended that Afrikaans be dropped.
“The university is thus busy ignoring the Constitutional rights of the Afrikaans students.”
He said AfriForum Youth will send a memorandum to the university containing his organisation’s language suggestions.
“In the meantime AfriForum had already instructed its legal team to investigate the legality of the language policy process followed by Tuks,” Barnard said.
Violence erupted at the Tuks Hatfield and Groenkloof campuses some three months ago, between two groups over language and other issues. The violent protests forced the university to close its doors for several weeks.
Also read:
Petrol bombing at Tuks protest
Do you have more information about the story? Please send us an email to editorial@rekord.co.za or phone us on 083 625 4114.
For free breaking and community news, visit Rekord’s websites:
For more news and interesting articles, like Rekord on Facebook, follow us on Twitter or Instagram.
- We have exciting news! We’re offering a free alert to help you always be in the loop. Send an email with the word ‘Subscribe’ to breakingnews@rekord.co.za to receive your free daily breaking news update.
