Wilgenhof drama could have been avoided if university had acted rationally: Jaco Rabie - Biznews

The Wilgenhof controversy at Stellenbosch University highlights how flawed investigations, politicized decisions, and media sensationalism can ignite institutional crises. Despite no evidence of misconduct, a report linked the residence to harmful ideologies, prompting closure recommendations. Legal challenges by alumni and residents exposed procedural errors, bias, and questionable leadership interference. While a settlement ensures Wilgenhof’s temporary preservation, the saga underscores the dangers of decisions driven by ideology rather than facts, straining trust in transformation efforts.

Jaco Rabie

For ten months, Wilgenhof has kept receiving intense attention. The saga has followed an unnecessarily complicated path, one that has seriously damaged the name of Stellenbosch University (SU).

A flawed investigative report, the actions of the university management, and a small but vocal political minority have turned sensationalised photos of discontinued practices into nothing less than an institutional crisis. It could easily have been avoided.

Central to the Wilgenhof debate is a panel’s investigative report into the residence. Even though the report states, “the panel found no evidence of physical violence, sexual violence or sexually inappropriate conduct having been perpetrated by the Nagligte” (the residence’s disciplinary committee), it still recommended closure of the residence. The reasons? Abstract and wholly incorrect arguments and speculation about race, history and symbolism. The report falsely accused the residence of practices linked to the Ku Klux Klan and Nazis.

The Rectorate, however, accepted the report without reservation.

Material flaws
Given the material flaws in the report, the Wilgenhof Alumni Association approached the courts to have it reviewed and set aside, as well as all decisions flowing from it. The report defamed alumni, and the panel also made procedural errors, such as failing to properly engage with the alumni and current students. Furthermore, the panel acted outside its mandate in recommending closure.

Equally damning is a recent affidavit filed in regard to the case by former constitutional court judge and SU Chancellor Edwin Cameron. He set out a timeline that shows how the Rector, Wim de Villiers, and the Council Chair, Nicky Newton-King, interfered in the panel’s processes.

After De Villiers’ and Newton-King’s intervention, the supposedly “independent” panel simply deleted from their report the option to keep Wilgenhof open – and closure became the only option.

An internal SU investigation into the actions of De Villiers and Newton-King must be completed by 2 December. Whatever the outcome of that process, the Wilgenhof Alumni Association will continue its court action to have this fundamentally flawed report set aside.

The management’s handling of the report is not the only example of deeply disappointing behaviour by the university. It decided to close Wilgenhof for a full year for “necessary renovations” (even after extensive renovations were done as recently as two years ago), to scatter the Wilgenhof community across other residences, and even to, in effect, force senior students to seek expensive private accommodation.

United
In a separate legal action, the parents and current residents united as the Association for the Advancement of Wilgenhof Residents (AWIR) to fight the social, academic, financial, and psychological damage closure would cause. Almost immediately, the university’s “expert legal opinion indicated that there was a real chance for the application by AWIR to be granted”, as De Villiers himself recently admitted. This led to an out-of-court settlement with AWIR.

The fact that the university entered into a settlement and backtracked on its decision is significant. Now it says the “necessary renovations” can very easily be completed within six months and the Wilgenhof community can stay together in alternative accommodation and then return to the residence. Is it any wonder that the university management’s behaviour on this matter has caused mistrust?

In announcing the settlement, the university stated: “It is important to note that the settlement does not compromise on the crux of the Council decision, i.e. to close the residence in its current form and embark on a facilitated process towards a reimagined, renewed, and rejuvenated student community.”

All the university’s words about discussion, fairness and community ring hollow if they settle with the residents, but are still bent on the initial decision of closing Wilgenhof. Such statements signal that SU’s goal has always been to bring an end to the oldest men’s residence in the country, to try and appease radical voices on and off campus.

In these circumstances, it is understandable that more and more parties are accusing the university of making decisions based on ideology, and not on facts.

Intractable
The Wilgenhof Alumni Association was also willing to settle out of court, but the university proved intractable about assurances regarding the preservation of elements of heritage. A new official name for Wilgenhof was proposed by the residents and supported by the Wilgenhof Alumni Association, one incorporating Afrikaans, English, and Xhosa, in line with SU’s own language policy. This was not accepted by the university, and was a primary reason why the Alumni Association could not settle its case against SU.

Recently, Newton-King herself publicly said that those who questioned the university’s decisions on Wilgenhof (as convoluted and irrational as these decisions have been) are against change and transformation. A disingenuous argument at best. Everyone can read interviews, opinion pieces and university submissions by many Wilgenhof alumni, including alumni of colour, that praise the residence’s transformation efforts and diversity – a project that has taken place over decades and delivered a united brotherhood that also happens to be just as demographically diverse as the wider SU campus.

Attempts to paint Wilgenhof as some bastion of white supremacy also ring hollow when so many black former residents tell the media and the university that they want to send their own sons to the residence in the future.

But the editor of the largest news publication in South Africa went so far as to argue that a shadowy cabal of old Afrikaners seeks to recapture Stellenbosch. The debate about Wilgenhof has been filled with many inaccurate and offensive tabloid tropes – from cultish sexual initiation practices to a Broederbond-like mafia of billionaires.

Disservice
Some sections of the media have done a great disservice to true, actual transformation at SU. Through their misrepresentations and race-baiting, they actually run the risk of polarising campus and increasing racial suspicions. Unity on campus should not be set back because of irresponsible reporting.

Wilgenhof is simply not the racist and violent place that extreme political voices and some in the media so desperately want it to be. It is often ignored that, when compared to SU itself, Wilgenhof has a more progressive track record of embracing change and transformation. A residence with such a proud history should not be made a scapegoat by a university seeking to publicly trumpet its commitment to transformation.

The Wilgenhof saga is important because it has exposed a wider truth: too many institutions in South Africa get caught up in political frenzies and then make bad decisions to appease voices that cannot be appeased. That is why the Wilgenhof Alumni Association is looking forward to rationally stating its case in a court of law, where facts matter. One hopes for the sake of the university that it will learn from its costly mishandling of the situation and avoid similar crises in the future.

Jaco Rabie is the spokesperson of the Wilgenhof Alumni Association

https://www.biznews.com/rational-perspective/2024/11/27/wilgenhof-drama-jaco-rabie

This article was first published on the Daily Friend.