Members of the uMkhonto weSizwe Youth League gathered in Soweto township on Sunday, June 16th to mark the 48th anniversary of the 1976 student uprising against apartheid’s racist Bantu Education policies.
Hundreds attended the commemorative event held at the Hector Pieterson Memorial, named for the 13-year-old killed when police opened fire on protesting students on June 16, 1976.
In their X post, the league stated: “June 16 marks a pivotal day in South Africa, a day on which the Youth of 1976 were brutally massacred by the Apartheid Regime while fighting against the oppressive system of the Apartheid government, most notably the Bantu Education Act.”
The league used the occasion to renew their demands for free university education and criticize the current administration under President Cyril Ramaphosa.
They accused Ramaphosa’s government of perpetuating an “unjust and unfair system” in higher education that marginalizes the poor by defunding financial aid, resulting in students being deregistered.
“The whole DANC, the Ramaphosa pet project, is spitting on the pain and graves of young people who were brutally tortured and murdered by the brutal National Party of Apartheid, which today masquerades as the DA,” it said.
The group praised former president Jacob Zuma, who ran in the 2024 election under the uMkhonto weSizwe ticket, for declaring a plan for free tertiary education to be phased in starting 2018.
“President Zuma declared access should not be limited to those who can afford it, but inclusive of all marginalized by the colonized education system,” the league stated.
The 1976 Soweto Uprising began as a protest against being forced to use Afrikaans as the language of instruction under apartheid’s Bantu Education policies. Hundreds were killed in the crackdown, helping turn global opinion against white minority rule.
While somber commemorations took place nationwide on Sunday, the uMkhonto weSizwe Youth League used the occasion to renew demands for free university education for all as part of their push for broader “economic emancipation.”
