Dear Rector/Vice-Chancellor, Professor Tyrone Pretorious and the University of the Western Cape's Executive Management,

The University of the Western Cape's newly elected Students' Representative Council has, in it's very early days, shown the student body that they do not care for them, but instead care more for themselves. We hereby invoke our constitutional right as provided for in Section 17 of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 1996, which provides that, “Everyone has the right, peacefully and unarmed, to assemble, to demonstrate, to picket and to present petitions.” This is petition is a vote of no confidence.

Their actions in respect of:

• #FeesMustFall Protest where they represented their own interests and agenda, as well as wanting to take sole leadership of the protest whereas it was agreed that it would be a joint-multi-party leadership. Instead, they made it more about politics and chose to politicise the protest instead of unite and join the protest as a student body. Throughout this process, they have shown lack of support as a result of their sulkiness because they could not lead this protest on their own.

• Meeting on 28 October 2015, with UWC Management in deciding that year-end examinations would be further postponed to 9 November 2015. At no point did the SRC make it known to the student body that they were going to meet with UWC Management in this respect in order for students to make their grievances known and instead attended the meeting & ended up making a huge decision that affects the entire student body, again, the student body whom they are supposed to represent were not even made aware of this, and not even made to be involved in this massive decision! They clearly do not represent us, the student body, but instead represent their own interests. They could so quickly distance themselves from the protest in an email sent out BEFORE the protest even occurred yet they could not do the same in respect to this meeting? A DECISION MADE BY 12 STUDENTS ON BEHALF OF A STUDENT BODY THAT IS JUST OVER 22 000 STUDENTS & NEVER CONSULTED US REGARDING THIS DECISION, IS DESPICABLE TO SAY THE LEAST. We are sure that this decision would not have gone ahead had the entire student body been consulted.

We, the student body of the University of the Western Cape, formally issue a vote of no confidence in our SRC, and call for the SRC to be disbanded as they no longer deemed fit to hold this position.

The SRC has shown in the ways listed above, that they are incapable and do not represent the interests of the entire student body, but instead make decisions on their own. It is evident that they have their own mandate.

Signed,

Student Body of the University of the Western Cape

* ATTENTION STUDENTS: Please sign the petition with your FULL NAME (as it appears on your MYUWC Gmail email address), STUDENT NUMBER and MYUWC GMAIL EMAIL ADDRESS. This is vital in respect of the signatures.

* Furthermore, I'd like to state that this is not a petition that pertains to the political nature of the SRC, and the elections that recently took place. This is not a petition that has been started as a result of various surrounding circumstances and views in relation to the election results, i.e. allegations that this petition is that of any opposition political student organisations to that of SASCO. This is completely false. This petition pertains to the fact that the SRC only cares for their own agenda and own interests. Regardless of their views, they could have put their differences aside and taken the protestors' Memorandum of Understanding and presented it along with their own. This they failed to do or even consider, and showed that they care more for themselves than to put their differences aside and represent the student body at large.