DA welcomes announcement that Stellenbosch University will be defunded if Afrikaans is abolished
11 November 2022
Please find attached English and Afrikaans soundbites by Dr Leon Schreiber MP.
Immediately following the publication of Stellenbosch University’s (SU) Khampepe report – which equated the Afrikaans language with racism and urged its total abolition – the Democratic Alliance (DA) wrote a letter to Het Jan Marias Fonds, which is the founding donor of the university.
This fund is divided into two trusts: one of which is managed by SU itself, and the other by a private board of trustees. In response to the DA’s letter, the second of these trusts has, for the very first time, publicly committed that – as per the last will and testament of Jannie Marais – its donations to the university “would definitely dry up if SU is anglicised.”
The DA welcomes this decisive response to the crisis triggered by the sloppy, anecdotal and insulting Khampepe report. This report recommends the abolition of Afrikaans based on only 22 voluntary submissions and only a single interview with a bona fide witness.