ActionSA’s student chapter has been slapped with a four-day ban from campaigning in the UCT’s upcoming student leadership elections for “jumping the gun”.
The political movement was handed the ban on Friday by UCT’s election committee after it found that the party disobeyed election rules by campaigning prematurely and involving “external influences” in the run-up to the Student Representative Council (SRC) elections.
The campaign period for the SRC elections is scheduled to begin on Monday, and ActionSA was penalised for starting early by inviting its leader, Herman Mashaba, onto the campus.
The commission referred to a Twitter screenshot from Mashaba, dated September 12, where he announced that he would be launching the manifesto of the student movement on Friday.
The event was halted by the university.
The commission also banned the movement’s candidates from campaigning in person or on any social media platforms.
“This includes no posters being put up. That they may not attend Q&A (sessions) on Tuesday in the residences. No campaigning on online platforms,” said Edwina Brooks, the institution’s chief electoral officer in a letter to ActionSA.
The student movement’s deputy chairperson, Matthew George, claimed that the ruling was an attempt to exclude ActionSA’s UCT branch from the political process on campus.
“These sanctions would mean that ActionSA loses more than half of the campaigning time available for SRC candidates.
“ActionSA will consult its legal team so that we may satisfy ourselves that the university is not misapplying its rules to the detriment of ActionSA’s student chapter,” he said.
The voting period is set to run from September 26 to 30, and the results will be announced on October 5.