Cape Town – The Western Cape’s African National Congress Youth League (ANCYLWC) on Monday expressed their dissatisfaction with recent comments made by student movement Rhodes Must Fall (RMF) regarding Marikana and the country’s leaders.
“If you claim to represent the struggles of the masses then you do not disregard and cast dispersion on the leaders,” said ANCYLWC provincial chairperson Muhammad Khalid Sayed.
Talking from the mother body’s Cape Town headquarters, Sayed referred to recent remarks made by the RMF that President Jacob Zuma and Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa had been complicit in the murder of Marikana miners.
“We actually approached them [RMF] and said, ‘Give us your proof’,” he said, “There is no court of law which has proven our two leaders have been guilty of murder.”
The rest of the ANCYLWC provincial executive committee echoed Sayed’s sentiments saying they fully supported Zuma and Ramaphosa and that if there was any blood on their hands it was “from burying comrades who had been murdered by the apartheid government”.
Sayed added that from the onset, the ANCYLWC made it clear their support for RMF had limitations.
“We do not identify with what it has morphed into and we warned against formation because the campaign would become exclusionary,” he said.
Sayed said the ANCYLWC supported the fight against discrimination and inequality experienced by tertiary level students and had not aligned itself to any movement or organisation.
He added that the Youth League was saddened by the recent claims of racism at Stellenbosch University, depicted in the online documentary, “Luister”. Luister was posted on the internet by student movement Open Stellenbosh earlier in August and told the stories of more than 30 individuals who said they had experienced racism on campus.
“We will not hesitate to defend those who are being discriminated against,” said Sayed.
ANA