Johannesburg – South Africans studying abroad have been arrested, incarcerated, lack patriotism and good manners, and they’re meant to be ambassadors for the country.
But their illicit activities have been placed under the microscope by Higher Education and Training Minister Blade Nzimande, who at the weekend lifted the lid on students abroad behaving badly.
Addressing a gathering of the Young Communist League in Joburg, the SACP general secretary stressed the need for a dose of patriotism and respect among the students overseas. Each year the government sends thousands of students to countries such as Cuba for their undergraduate and postgraduate studies.
But the students’ behaviour abroad left much to be desired, with the minister characterising the scholars as rowdy, unruly, and unpatriotic.
A shocked Nzimande revealed that at least one South African student was doing time in a Chinese jail for allegedly assaulting a fellow student.
The minister had also been briefed by his European counterparts that South African students were the most unpatriotic of international students because they spoke very negatively about their country.
A senior SACP official, who spoke to The Star, said he was shocked by the behaviour displayed by the country’s students during his trip to Cuba earlier this year.
The official, who was visiting a medical school in Havana, said he saw some binge-drinking South African students urinating in public and breaking beer bottles on the streets.
“That is exactly the behaviour you see in South African townships, especially during weekends,” the official said.
In December last year, Muziwokuthula Madondo, accused of killing four people in the US in 2011, was sentenced to 30 years' jail for two of the crimes. He faces the death penalty for the other crimes.
DA higher education spokesperson Professor Belinda Bozzoli said that if South African students broke the law abroad, “they should be apprehended, charged and punished”.
On the issue of patriotism or lack of it, Bozzoli said the students had a right to speak their mind.
SA Students' Congress national organiser Lwando Majiza said: “We don’t agree with Minister Nzimande that students abroad are generally ill-disciplined and ungrateful. However, we agree with his analysis that they lack patriotism."