Student disputes in need of intermediary

VIOLENCE is not the answer to resolving mutual interest disputes or disputes in pursuance of human rights. It never will be.

The death of a student outside Durban University of Technology spells out the need for all stakeholders to set up agreed protocols aimed, like labour disputes, at expeditiously resolving disputes. To this end there should be a constitutionally mandated structure, very much like the Council for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration, which can intervene in instances like this.

In this way there is a pressure valve in place to ease tensions before they reach critical mass.

That student, in search of better prospects through education, would not have died had there been a common sense yet robust approach through an impartial intermediary, legally empowered to resolve, or at least manage, disputes.

I hope the ministry of higher education considers my suggestion.