SRC drags UB leadership to court
Baboki Kayawe | Friday April 7, 2017 17:39
In their filling notice at the High Court on Tuesday, the applicants want an order declaring that the disciplinary proceedings instituted against UB students pursuant to the ‘revised and simplified University of Botswana Student Code of Conduct’ are null and void.
Moreover, the student leaders want the Court to declare charges issued to students on March 14 2017- subsequent to student protests early this year to be null and void too.
Student leaders are decrying the scrapping out of the old student code of conduct, leading to the coming into effect of the revised instrument, which has taken away their rights.
“Apparently the old student code of conduct was amended in March 2014 but students were never made aware of the changes, we were given a hard copy just recently,” said SRC vice-president Dikosha Dikosha.
Among the many contestations about the revised student disciplinary apparatus is that unlike the old, it does not clarify the composition of the student disciplinary committee.
As per the filling notice, the SRC wants the Court to pronounce that Chairperson of the disciplinary committee Hlanganiso Roy has no authority to appoint members who constitute the student disciplinary committee, and as such any appointment he made be nullified.
“We understand it is supposed to have five members, however, it keeps on fluctuating at one point there were nine members in a hearing,” Dikosha said.
“It compels us to say if the disciplinary committee is not well constituted then the findings that they arrive at should be set aside.”
Moreover, he said it took away students’ right to representation as well as not being specific in timeframes. In the older instrument, university employees were allowed to sit and speak on behalf of learners while the new one has taken that away.
“The older law allowed time for offences to be reported 14 days, and then charges follow 14 days after the offence is reported. Those provisions have been removed,” he added.
Fundamentally, the older dispensation demanded that students be given all the necessary material relevant for their case (witness statements, CCTV footage, etc) so they could essentially participate in the hearing, he explained.
“We are seeing an unprecedented culture from the disciplinary committee where students now enter into disciplinary hearings without any evidence,” he said.
Chairperson of the disciplinary committee, Roy and the UB are also listed as respondents in the matter.
Towards the end of March, five members of the SRC and 19 students who were summoned for disciplinary hearings following an inquiry on the strike learnt their hearings were postponed.
“The postponement was due to the demands and requests that we put before the committee bothering around issues of procedure and substantive fairness,” Dikosha said.
However, on Tuesday, individual student hearings started, prompting this legal suit.
“To our surprise individual hearings started on Tuesday though there are pending administrative questions. For instance, we requested the minutes of the disciplinary committee’s previous sitting sometimes this semester but were never availed,” he added.
We also demand a copy of the inquiry, which places a crucial part in our defence case, he said.
Hence the SRC wants an order declaring that students facing disciplinary charges are entitled to be issued with a report of the disciplinary inquiry conducted by the Director-Student Welfare to establish that such students have a prima facie case to answer.
Further, they are seeking an order declaring that student disciplinary hearings shall not interrupt with student’s academic engagements such as tests, examinations and other forms of assessment and that the Court to direct Mokgwathi, Roy and the student disciplinary committee to pay costs of the application. Attorney Kago Mokotedi represents the students.