The Spark

The Campus Students' Parliament is a primary accountability and policy development unit. It is the basic and nuclear unit of expression of students' aspirations politically and otherwise. It is important that as revolutionaries we begin the attempt to seize the CSP and make it a true arena of the masses at a campus level. The University of Fort Hare EL-Campus has displayed that there are still revolutionary elements within the campus during the fight against the Direct Payment System which was aborted by the ISRC and its vacillating leadership. It is of significant importance that this Organ of power is positioned in a manner that will make it a driver of Student Activism not only within the East London Campus but across the Institution. State of Activism in UFH-EL Campus The state of activism in UFH-EL Campus can be best described as the kicks of a dying horse. This CSP session is a make-or-break due to how it can either kill activism and sell students to the highest bidder or...

The first half of the 2023 academic year concluded with a fierce contest between student leadership, managers of institutions of higher learning, and the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS). This fierce fight was caused by the decision of the scheme to take over key operations, in relation to disbursement of allowances to students and accreditation of residences. This meant that these two important tasks which were previously carried out by institutions of higher learning with the help of external service providers, particularly for the former task, of disbursing allowances, will now be taken over by NSFAS. NSFAS announced that the task of disbursing allowances will now be outsourced to five external financial service providers. Our observation in relation to the response by the student movement in the country, suggests that it was this decision that agitated student leaders and made them reject the so-called direct payments method introduced by NSFAS. Hashtags li...