Cape Town - Guerilla art collective Tokolos Stencils on Friday cried censorship after Facebook closed its account on the basis that it is “not a real person”.
The group said it believed the University of Cape Town had prevailed on Facebook to block it from the social media forum in response to its graffiti campaign on the campus to mark the third anniversary of the 2012 Marikana shooting and protest over the UCT Retirement Fund's shareholding in mining company Lonmin to the tune R9.5 million.
“On Monday, exactly one week after our radical action on the campus of the University of Cape Town in which we made known UCT's collusion with white monopoly capital, and in particular Lonmin (#LonminHasBloodOnItsHands), Tokolos Stencils' Facebook account was taken down by Facebook authorities,” the group said in an email.
“This is an act of censorship. Facebook has colluded with our haters to censor our work and our voice.” It said it was not surprised and it was time to stop relying on corporations to enable free speech.
“Such freedoms can never exist when they are managed by a capitalist ruling class.
“Whether or not we are able to get back on Facebook is irrelevant. Our struggle exists in the real world and we will continue to take political action in real life, on buildings, walls, pillars and statues, to bring forward our struggle for a better world, where land is returned to its rightful owners, where the people rule and the government (if it exists at all) obeys, and where everyone has food on the table because their labour is no longer stolen by blood sucking capitalists and their government.”
UCT could not comment immediately.
ANA