Cape Town – The global Black Lives Matter movement has prompted students of colour at Stellenbosch University (SU) to speak out about a traumatic 2014 incident where the words, "hotnot", "moffie" and "k****r" were written on their residence doors.
The institution said it could not link a specific student or group of students to the incident, despite being supplied with pictures of the writing and identities of the students allegedly involved.
Former student Matthew Jeptha said he felt that nothing was done after he was among a number of students who had derogatory words painted on their doors at the Helshoogte men's residence.
After a campus event, Jeptha recalled: “One door in our section had a bunch of hashtags on it with every demeaning word in the book written in blue and black permanent marker.
“After taking the matter up with the Stellenbosch disciplinary committee, despite the fact that I was able to narrow down the individuals and take pictures of the incident - nothing came of it."
He said the matter was not addressed with students in any house meeting.
“The alumni are too busy protecting the filthy mentalities and ideologies they fought so hard to uphold at that institution. The residences are a breeding ground for racism.
"As first-generation people of colour, we are silenced and reminded that we are lucky to be there in the first place,” he said.
In a statement, the university said the matter was referred by the student to be investigated by the University’s student discipline division in 2014, but no evidence was found to link a specific student or group of students to the incident.
“The complainant was orally informed about the outcome of the investigation on October 30 2014 by the then head of student discipline,” the university said.
“It is deeply regrettable that students have had to experience any form of intolerance or racism. Like many universities, SU grapples with the same deep-rooted prejudices prevalent in our South African society,” the institution said.
Since then, the university has instituted a new residence placement policy and a new language policy, and set up the equality unit.
It also adopted a new vision and strategic framework of which a "transformative student experience" is a core strategic theme.
“The student affairs division works tirelessly to create awareness and to change mindsets. A new student disciplinary code was adopted in 2016 that further improved the investigation and disciplinary actions in matters such as this.
“Even though SU intentionally works to grow the university community into understanding how to live as a more diverse and inclusive community, this unfortunately does not preclude transgressions from happening.
“The university strives to resolve such issues within the framework of all its policies, but it acknowledges and is saddened by the hurt caused by lived experiences,” the university said.