Latest News Archive
Please select Category, Year, and then Month to display items
31 March 2021
|
Story Xolisa Mnukwa
The University of the Free State (UFS) Bloemfontein Campus conducted its first digital Campus Student Representative Council (CSCR) elections for the 2020/2021 SRC term. Elections for the 12 ex officio portfolios were conducted from 1 to 4 December 2020, while the elections for the 7 elective portfolios were conducted from 23 to 26 March 2021.
Of the 22 941
eligible voters for the elective portfolios, 8 044 cast their votes, which accounts for 35% of the voter’s roll. The 2021 voter turnout is an increase of 9,53% compared to the 2019 elections that were conducted manually. The CSRC incumbents mentioned below were officially inaugurated on 29 March 2021 and an official handover of the outgoing to the incoming incumbents was facilitated by the Student Governance Office.
The results below depict the final outcome of the CSRC elective portfolios. Elections were concluded at 21:00 on 26 March 2021. Watch video for the official inauguration.
Position | Candidate | Votes |
PRESIDENT | Jerry Thoka | 5 747 (74,6%) |
Kamohelo Seleke | 1 960 (25.4%) |
DEPUTY PRESIDENT | Loretta Mosito | 5 563 (72,4%) |
Esona Yapi | 2 116 (27,6%) |
SECRETARY | Ayanda Dlova | 5 988 (78,3%) |
Simphiwe Zonke | 1 660 (21,7%) |
TREASURER | Orefile Sefika | 5 425 (70,7%) |
Thandiwe Kula | 2 246 (29,3%) |
POLICY AND TRANSFORMATION | Vusumzi Gqalane | 4 988 (63,8%) |
Thabo Duma | 1 649 (21,1%) |
Nompumelelo Khoza | 1 178 (15,1%) |
STUDENT DEVELOPMENT AND FIRST-GENERATION STUDENTS | Tshiamo Sebolai | 4 681 (60,4%) |
Fhumulani Sididzha | 1 707 (22,0%) |
Ofentse Ntsane | 1 365 (17,6%) |
COMMUTER STUDENTS | Dimpho Mokhoantle | 4 469 (58,1%) |
Marumo Rakwata | 1 643 (21,4%) |
Lusanda Feleza | 1 582 (20,6%) |
The results below depict the outcome of the ex officio elections that took place from 1 to 4 December 2020:
Position | Candidate |
---|
ASSOCIATIONS STUDENT COUNCIL | Michael Mnguni |
STUDENT ORGANISATIONS COUNCIL | Tebogo Sako |
ACADEMIC STUDENT COUNCIL | Katlego Booysen |
DAY RESIDENCE COUNCIL | Sibongiseni Mncela |
CAMPUS RESIDENCE COUNCIL | Mpho Maubane |
POSTGRADUATE STUDENT COUNCIL | Nico Janse van Rensburg |
INTERNATIONAL STUDENT COUNCIL | Rufaro Chakanyuka |
STUDENT MEDIA AND DIALOGUE COUNCIL | Wandile Manqele |
UNIVERSAL ACCESS AND SOCIAL JUSTICE COUNCIL | Katlego Sekele |
CIVIC AND SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY COUNCIL | Gert Terblanche |
ARTS AND CULTURE COUNCIL | Katleho Khaola |
SPORTS COUNCIL | Bongumusa Khumalo |
Expert in Africa Studies debunks African middle class myth
2016-05-10
From left: Prof Heidi Hudson, Director of the Centre for Africa Studies (CAS), Joe Besigye from the Institute of Reconciliation and Social Justice, and Prof Henning Melber, Extraordinary Professor at the CAS and guest lecturer for the day. Photo: Valentino Ndaba
|
Until recently, think tanks from North America, the African Development Bank, United Nations Development Plan, and global economists have defined the African middle class based purely on monetary arithmetic. One of the claims made in the past is that anyone with a consumption power of $2 per day constitutes the middle class. Following this, if poverty is defined as monetary income below $1.5 a day, it means that it takes just half a dollar to reach the threshold considered as African middle class.
Prof Henning Melber highlighted the disparities in the notion of a growing African middle class in a guest lecture titled A critical anatomy of the African middle class(es), hosted by our Centre for Africa Studies (CAS) at the University of the Free State on 4 May 2016. He is an Extraordinary Professor at the Centre, as well as Senior Adviser and Director Emeritus of the Dag Hammarskjöld Foundation in Sweden.
Prof Melber argued that it is misleading to consider only income when identifying the middle class. In his opinion, such views were advanced by promoters of the global neo-liberal project. “My suspicion is that those who promote the middle class discourse in that way, based on such a low threshold, were desperate to look for the success story that testifies to Africa rising.”
Another pitfall of such a middle-class analysis is its ahistorical contextualisation. This economically-reduced notion of the class is a sheer distortion. Prof Melber advised analysts to take cognisance of factors, such as consumption patterns, lifestyle, and political affiliation, amongst others.
In his second lecture for the day, Prof Melber dealt withthe topic of: Namibia since independence: the limits to Liberation, painting the historical backdrop against which the country’s current government is consolidating its political hegemony. He highlighted examples of the limited transformation that has been achieved since Namibia’s independence in 1990.