Fazel has worked with the Abahlali baseMjondolo Shackdweller’s movement since it began in 2005, and has produced a number of videos with them, in partnership with Sally Giles. Below is the first part of Breyani and the Councillor. You can see it all, here. There’s also a fantastic video from last year’s strike. See here for more.
Sunday, 29 April 2007
To all COMSA members
Comrades,
As you all know, last week I was finally fired after a 7 month disciplinary process. I am not the first person to have been forced out of this university on political grounds in recent months. When I was fired I was clearly told that I will not be the last.
When the media asked me questions about my removal from a photograph and article in UKZNdaba last year I answered them honestly and in good faith. I was certainly not being dishonest and anyone who reads the transcript of my hearing will see that the University failed to prove their claim that I had been dishonest. Read the rest of this entry »
Dear Professor Makgoba
We write to you because of a growing concern that the Freedom of Expression Institute has had over the recent past regarding the state of freedom of expression and of academic freedom at the University of KwaZulu Natal. We believe that free expression and academic freedom are in severe decline at your university and urge you to act expeditiously to stem this trend which is already derailing your vision of being “the premier university of African scholarshipâ€. Read the rest of this entry »
Fazel Khan, a sociology lecturer at the University of KwaZulu Natal (UKZN), faces a disciplinary committee and possible a dismissal for an interview he gave to members of the media. The Freedom of Expression Institute (FXI), a member of IFEX reports this is not an isolated case. The Organisation informs that in the past six months, there seems to be a certain fear in the University Staff (Academics, Students and Workers) in challenging or criticising the university administration.
FACTS OF THE CASE: Mr Khan criticised an article regarding him published in the summer issue of Ukzndaba, a newsletter published by UKZN’s Public Affairs and Corporate Communications Department. For his words of criticism he has been called in front of a University’s disciplinary committee and, according, FXI, faces possible dismissal.
Available at the South Africa Indymedia site.
October 12, 2006
Dear Vice-Chancellor M. W. Makgoba,
I am writing on behalf of the editorial board of the Committee for Academic Freedom in Africa (CAFA) to express our concern about disciplinary action instituted against University of KwaZulu-Natal sociologist, Fazel Khan. Our belief is that charges against Khan to be presented at the October 18th hearing, namely that he made comments critical of university management in the media, should be immediately dropped since they undermine basic principles of academic freedom. Universities are built on critical thinking, reflection, discussion, and free speech and thus we are very disturbed to hear that that staff and students at UKZN have become fearful of making any comments critical of the university and its management. We see this as an expression of the continuing repression of thought and speech that is developing at UKZN and believe that you must address these issues immediately. Read the rest of this entry »
Letter to the Editor, Mail & Guardian, November 24 to November 30 2006,
We need Khans In the shackdwellers’ movement, we do not have the money to train as academics or send our children to train as academics. Therefore, we rely on others to bring back the fruits of their knowledge to the poor.
University of KwaZulu-Natal lecturer Fazel Khan is one of few academics who brings his learning to the people. For UKZN to bring him before a disciplinary committee is unacceptable.
The universities must work to build more Khans. If they try to destroy them, they, as institutions, will just be about individuals getting good jobs for themselves — they will not be about the society any more.
If we do not stand against this action, UKZN as a social project will cease to exist, and the fruits of academic learning will be lost to the poor.
There is no point in sending students to university if they are banned from coming back to their communities and working with the poor — as Khan has done.
– S’bu Zikode, president, Abahlali baseMjondolo
When former Minister Kader Asmal described the landscape of higher education in 1999 as one which was “largely dictated by the geo-political imagination of apartheid planners” many academics and students eagerly anticipated a new imagination upon which the academy would be reconfigured, one which would even inspire a continental renewal. Today, on the back of ongoing technocratic reform and the impact of corporate globalisation, changes are best described as desultory and ordinary. South Africa has not escaped the debasement of higher education, a process which recasts public space as a commodified sphere, with students as consumers and staff as sales consultants. Read the rest of this entry »
At the end of 2005, the Mercury published the article below. Although it contains some inaccuracies (not least around Fazel Khan’s affiliation - he was with the Department of Sociology, not the Centre for Civil Society), it indicates a history of intimidation directed towards Fazel.
UKZN academic accuses mayor of meddling
Read the rest of this entry »
Here’s a video from UKZN’s February 2006 Strike, made by Giles and Khan.
All kinds of rumours are circulating about this case. The best way to show the truth is to use the official documents from the case. Here is a list of those documents to which Fazel has access, unedited, so that you can make up your own mind. All the links are clickable.