Johannesburg – Alleged riots instigator and former Ukhozi FM radio host Ngizwenkosi Mchunu says students who benefitted in 2016 nationwide #FeesMustFall campaign should rally behind Bonginkosi Khanyile in his legal woes.
Khanyile continues to languish in police holding cells at the Durban Central police station following the decision by presiding Magistrate Vincent Hlatshwayo to reserve judgment pertaining to his bail application.
This means that the Fees Must Fall activist will spend another week inside police cells. He was arrested on 20 August at Wits University student residence and linked with the deadly riots which culminated into wide-scale looting of businesses mainly in Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal.
The showdown led to the demise of more than 300 people with KZN recording the highest death toll. Khanyile faces two counts of inciting public violence, a count of not wearing a face mask while in public and two counts relating to holding an illegal gathering.
Venting out on his online radio known as Ngizwe Online, Mchunu who is also facing troubles with the law lamented that Khanyile was being left out in the cold by his fellow students.
“People like Bonginkosi Khanyile, the man who was kept in jail for six months for fighting against students’ financial exclusion. Even when Ubab Zuma (Jacob Zuma) was arrested he refused to rest on his laurels, he stood up and fought. We need people like him. Of grave disappointment to me is a lack of empathy from fellow students who were excluded because they were poor and couldn’t afford study fees. They should be returning the favour during this difficult time,” lamented Mchunu who spoke mainly in IsiZulu.
During the bail hearing on Tuesday, it also emerged that the argument advanced by Masibone Matomela, lawyer representing Khanyile that he must be granted bail to afford him an opportunity to see his minor children didn’t hold water.
Leading Hawks investigator Lieutenant Colonel Anton Booysen had earlier told court that Khanyile was an absent father who had spent a paltry R 250 maintaining each of his four children monthly.
The court also heard that Khanyile had been working as an intern at the Department of Cooperative Governance earning a monthly stipend of R 5000.
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