Some students want their own Marikana - Adam Habib
Johannesburg – Some students are calling for their own version of the Marikana massacre to advance their cause for free education, Wits University Vice Chancellor Adam Habib said on Monday.
"I have listened to some protesters who say that they want their own Marikana. I was engaging a student yesterday who said that people must die to advance the movement," he said at a summit on higher education.
Students needed to stop romanticising violence, Habib said.
He urged Police Minister Nathi Nhleko, who was at the event, to ensure those responsible for damage and violence were prosecuted.
"We have had close to a billion rand’s worth of infrastructure burnt at our universities in the last 18 months, and yet not a single person has been arrested and convicted. How many places in the world do you know which would allow such a situation to exist? We have to fix the crisis in policing and prosecution," Habib told Nhleko.