Kerri-Anne Swanepoel
On 9 October, University of Pretoria students arrived at Hatfield campus and were greeted with stickers on some of the university entrances reading “Blacks only” and “No whites allowed”.
The stickers drew widespread attention, and a heated debate ensued on social media platforms. Later that day, AfriForum Youth released a statement taking responsibility for pasting the stickers. In an email to staff and students, UP strongly condemned the behaviour while referring to several “racial incidents” that took place over the last month. In the email, the university noted that these incidents did not occur on-campus, which limits the university’s direct control over the situations.
In AfriForum Youth’s statement, they claimed the protest action (of pasting the stickers) followed events that took place on 27 September, where EFF members prevented white students from gaining access to the Hatfield campus. EFF members were recorded shouting, among other things, “only black students”. According to AfriForum Youth, several letters were sent to the university demanding the deregistration of the EFF Student Command (EFFSC UP) as a student society. In addition, AfriForum Youth has collected 5640 signatures (by 10 October) through a petition in support of this demand. They claimed the pasting of the stickers was in reaction to the university’s lack of response on their demand to deregister the EFFSC at UP.
In the email to students and staff, UP stated, “Our UP community’s well-being and safety are of paramount importance to us, and we want to assure you that we are actively addressing these issues to create a secure and inclusive environment for all.” Furthermore, they informed students about the enhancement of security measures on and around campus to provide a safer environment for all students. Additionally, the university will “continue to educate the community about the importance of diversity, tolerance, and respectful behaviour through workshops, seminars, and awareness campaigns”.
UP also made specific mention to three racial incidents in their email, with the first being an “incident off-campus involving am political protest where attempts were made to prevent some of our [the] students from accessing the campus”. The second referred to an incident during the SRC election period where black and white students clashed outside the university in a “street brawl” after “students reported being subjected to racial insults”. Videos of the incident were also shared on social media platforms. The final incident referred to in the UP email is that for which AfriForum Youth took responsibility, where “a group of mischievous individuals placed ‘no whites allowed’ and ‘blacks only’ stickers on certain entrances of the Hatfield Campus”.
PDBY interviewed Louis Boshoff, campaign officer at AfriForum Youth, to understand why they would post stickers that are in bad taste, racist, and fuelling racial tension at UP. “AfriForum is hoping to expose the double standards of the University of Pretoria’s management,” stated Boshoff. “Our actions yesterday morning were [in reference] to the EFF’s actions on 27 September 2023 … We interpreted it as UP had accepted such apartheid-like behaviour from the EFF students, and so we might as well place these stickers onto their entrances, saying ‘blacks only’ and ‘no whites allowed’. He continued, “We were in fact disgusted with the fact that UP management did not do anything about this; they did not even make a statement about this. And in response from AfriForum’s side, we brought it under their attention, and they only acknowledged that we sent the letter. However, they did not act in any way.”
This is not true according to Rikus Delport, director of the Department of Institutional Advancement. “We acknowledged response and immediately referred all the mentioned incidents to the relevant departments at UP, including the Department of Security Services and the Transformation office,” stated Delport. The outcome of the investigations is not finalised yet, and according to Delport, it is not UP policy to provide “rolling commentary to any organisation or political party on internal investigations”. He also refuted Boshoff’s claims. “Those accusations are completely baseless. There are no grounds for saying that, and if the parties do have evidence of that, then they must provide us with evidence. We as the university do not tolerate any forms of racism or intimidation, for that matter. We condemn any form of racism in the strongest possible terms.”
When asked what their preferred outcome would be, Boshoff responded that AfriForum Youth have applied pressure for the EFFSC to be deregistered as a student society. “We believe that their conduct cannot be accepted and that there should be action against them,” he explained.
In response to what the university’s next step will be, Delport stated, “We know who placed those stickers, so we are in discussion with the police on how to take this forward, as our property was defamed [defaced].”