ANC YOUTH LEAGUE WESTERN CAPE ANGERED BY UCT's NEW ADMISSIONS POLICY
17 June 2014
The African National Congress Youth League notes the recent decision by the University of Cape Town's Senate & Council to change the University's race based admissions policy (see Cape Times report). This change in admissions policy not only undermines the democratic gains made in the last 20 Years of our Democracy, but further undermines the spirit of our constitution.
The new admissions policy denies the link between race and disadvantage, and is ultimately antagonistic to the national transformation agenda. It is not possible to achieve a truly non-racial society without taking deliberate steps to transform our institutions of higher learning to be reflective of national demographics.
The new policy is essentially similar to the DA's "Open Opportunity Society" policy, and like this policy, it seeks to maintain the status quo. It cannot be called redress when a white Afrikaans student can be identified as disadvantaged through the socio-economic lens of the new policy.
It also cannot be redress when well-resourced schools such as Bishops and Rondebosch Boys have emerged as disadvantaged, while schools such as Mbilwi, located in rural Venda, which has had a 98% pass rate for the last 10 years will be classified as "privileged" despite the lack of resources and the location it finds itself in.