Beyond ‪#‎FeesMustFall‬

The following was delivered by a Mosibudi Rassie Rasethaba at a panel discussion at the University of Pretoria on the 14th April 2016

“Good Afternoon fellow panellists, colleagues and fallists

When I was asked to be on this panel today I was a bit reluctant as I believe that I was not in the right state of mind to have this talk yet. I am still trying to figure out where the fallist movement is and where it is going and what it really stands for. So do not expect too many answers from what I will say here today and with that said, let me start off with this.

“Each generation must discover its mission, fulfill it or betray it, in relative opacity.” This is a quote from the popular and widely read Frantz Fanon.

I start off with this quote because I believe we have a mission and it was long discovered before we were born. Our mission was discovered by those that went before us. You can find them all over the African continent, some are known but many have been erased from our collective memory. These are the young women and men of Africa who refused to be the subjects and servants of the Queens and Kings of Europe, who defied the unjust and brutal rulership of Kings and Queens unknown to them. These are the Haitians that led a revolution against the colonial masters.

Its 2016 and not much has changed from the colonial times. Yes, we might have what we call a democratic country, access to universities such as these but it is all the same. What we have today is a neo-colonial system that is not run by monarchs but multi-national corporations, bankers and Western powers. They dictate to the world, their colonies what they should do. Like the old colonial system that was managed by the indigenous elites who served the interests of their masters in Europe, the not so new system is managed by Governments and heads of institutions such as our very own University.

Now one of the question that was posed to us, is how the University of Pretoria together with government reacted to the demands put forward by the students? And the simple answer to that is that they responded like any good manger of the colonial system would. The university together with government responded to short term and immediate solutions to silence the potential overthrow of the unjust system. They pacified the students by throwing a 0% increase on fees and forming so called transformation committees with no true intention to transform or in this case decolonize as the fallist movement has imagined it.

The main focus of today’s discussion is decolonization of the curriculum. But before I go into that I want to say it is impossible to have a decolonized curriculum whilst we live in the colony. The so called curriculum will serve no good to the people of the colony, because in order for citizens to live and prosper in the colony they need the tools of the colony. So what I am proposing here today is that we decolonize Africa. The land and wealth must be returned to its rightful owners, and once that is done we can start speaking. When the indigenous people of Africa reclaim back the land their dignity and humanity will be restored and they will be able to speak on issues that matter to them. At the current moment it is difficult and near impossible to speak of a decolonized curriculum because academics know where their bread and butter comes from. Teaching or producing any knowledge outside of the dominant Eurocentric epistemology means no food on the table for you. This puts academics in a very difficult position, even though they want to deviate from the popular Eurocentric world view they are unable to.

With that said, I think focus needs to be put into the new student movements or fallist movement. Those are the spaces where a decolonized education needs to be taught. These are the spaces that help shape our thinking in order to overthrow the current unjust system that seeks to benefit a select few whilst marginalising and subjugating the majority. What is very evident is that these progressive spaces themselves need some house cleaning, failure to do so will only see a new group of elite intellectuals being produced. What the fallist movement has taught us, is that colonialism and imperialism has affected us violently in multiple and different ways. This means that whatever knowledge that is being discussed and produced needs to be intersectional in nature and be aware of how power and oppression operates on different levels. This is in order for the overthrow of the current unjust system as to usher in a new system that does not recreate the old oppressive and violent tendencies of the colony.

The fallist movement finds itself in a very difficult position. There isn’t one dominant guiding ideology, making it difficult for unity thus slowing down the progress. However through open dialogue, honesty and willingness to learn from each other the movement can achieve what those that have gone before us have failed to do. Overthrow the colonial masters, reclaim our humanity, dignity and the land.

To end off, I would like to say that if our movement cannot speak to the gogo in Giyani, the girl in Kuruman, the miner in Marikana it is a useless movement that is really not concerned with the true liberation of our people.  

It would be unfair of me to not acknowledge the resistance that has been shown by our black sisters and brothers in the former black universities, to our sisters in brothers in Rhodes must fall, Open Stellenbosh, BSM, Transform Wits and other Progressive student formations such as EFFSC and PASMA. Without their collective effort the project of decolinisation would be limited to just a few. They have helped reawaken our mission, but this time round we it is our duty as the daughters and sons of the soil to complete the mission.”

Mosibudi Rassie Rasethaba