Artists! Add your signature in support of #feesmustfall today
Artists! Artists who recognise that a free education is a human right. Artists with children who will benefit from the struggles being fought by this generation of students. Artists who will not stand by while this generation of students bleeds for rights that benefit all of us. Stand up and stand with students of #feesmustfall. Add your signature by emailing [email protected], send your protests against the militarisation of campuses nationwide. Today.
Artists in solidarity with FeesMustFall
The FeesMustFall student movements of 2015, that continue into 2016, represent a hugely important moment in post-1994 South Africa. We, the undersigned artists, stand in solidarity with the FeesMustFall movement calling for free education and an end to outsourcing.
Historically, artists have played important roles in political struggles for social justice, including in the anti-apartheid movements. As a new generation of artists, immersed in a new generation of struggles, we too must define our positions in relation to the political and social movements of our time. As artists who support the FeesMustFall movement, we call for artistic commitment that is based within the movement that does not see itself as separate to the everyday actions of students and workers. We also call on a cultural production that does not appropriate the popularity of the FeesMustFall movement towards self-serving ends.
We recognise that the students of FeesMustFall are risking their degrees, their careers, their bodies, their lives, their physical, emotional and psychological wellbeing in order to fight for a free education for all, for an end to outsourcing and employment conditions with dignity for workers. We support and appreciate their bravery and commitment, and their vision for a South Africa that we all want to live in.
22 years after democratic elections, universities are a site of systemic violence continually perpetrated against poor students, against black students, and against workers on campus. In building on a decade of student-worker solidarity, FeesMustFall has seen students and workers standing in solidarity with each other, tying free education to an end to outsourcing. This acknowledges that an enduring commitment to both of these ends holds the promise of pressing open space for this kind of work for justice on university campuses.
We call on all South African students to acknowledge the bravery of their peers, and to support the FeesMustFall protests. We ask that students recognise that the sacrifices they are asked to make for this cause are towards creating a more just and equal South Africa.
We call on all academics to support the students in their institution, and realise that minor inconveniences in their daily lives caused by the protest are in service of achieving a decolonised University.
We call on Universities to end violence against students and workers, to end police and private security presence on campus, before continuing engagement with students about their demands.
We call on police to treat their children with kindness and compassion.
We call on parents to support their children. We know parents want their children to be safe, happy, and successful. We know the sacrifices parents have made to allow their children to go to university. We ask parents, gently and with compassion, to see the sacrifices their children are making for the future of our country as a whole, for the next generations of students, so we do not keep moving forward into an ever deepening inequality.
We call on the country to understand that the actions of these students are rooted in courage and self-sacrifice, not hooliganism or selfishness, to acknowledge the commitment, the physical and emotional strength that are needed to continue protests against such opposition. We call on the country to support FeesMustFall. To listen before condemning, and to engage thoughtfully, from a position that acknowledges the bravery, agency, intellect, political strategy, integrity and commitment of the students and workers fighting for free education and an end to outsourcing.
Izwe Lethu Artists in Solidarity with FeesMustFall
Please email [email protected] with your details to add your name to the signatures, and/ or to be included in the email and whatsapp solidarity groups if you wish.