Tweets surfaced at the weekend claiming that the lecturer from the school of mechanical engineering called the workers derogatory names and apologised afterwards. He allegedly sent an email in which he called striking workers on campus monkeys.

In screenshots of an email apparently sent by him, the lecturer apologised for the remark and said the comment was not meant to be prejudicial.
“I hope that you can see beyond the words to appreciate that there was no hurtful intent,” the email said. “That is just not my nature. In context, words always mean something different. “I completely concede that this wasn’t funny and you have my unreserved apology. Unreserved. The line was crossed.”
Wits spokesperson Shirona Patel said there had been complaints submitted and the matter was under investigation.
“The university will investigate the allegations and, if they are true, disciplinary action will be taken against the lecturer in question in line with the university’s rules and processes,” Patel said.

“The university has a zero-tolerance approach towards any form of prejudice and will ensure that the matter is dealt with expeditiously.”
This comes as workers affiliated to Numsa at the institution embarked on strike action over higher wages.

The workers are demanding a 12% increase across the board, while the university is offering 8%. They are also demanding that 85 contract workers be insourced and that the lowest earners’ wages increase from R7 500 to R9000 per month.

The university is scheduled to reopen today for orientation week for new first-year students. A trend analysis released by the South African Human Rights Commission released earlier this month showed that human rights violations related to race remain endemic in South Africa.
Out of 749 complaints received by the commission between 2015 and 2016, 505 of them were those related to race.

Source: ANN7