Rhodes donated millions for the good of SA

Protesting students should also oppose his scholarship, writes John Whitlock from Germiston

Now that the Rhodes statue controversy is almost done and dusted, with Max Price stating that the statue must be moved, the next target by the anti-imperialist UCT students must be the Rhodes Scholarship.

This scholarship allows for two – three years’ postgraduate study at Oxford University, with a stipend of £13 650 per year (R245 ooo). Students also live in residence and have access to Rhodes House, a 20th century mansion with public rooms, gardens, a library and study areas.

All this provided by the Rhodes Trust.

In their endeavours to remove everything connected to Rhodes, the UCT students should fight to have the scholarship banned. Any student selected should decline the opportunity.

Yet in 2003 Nelson Mandela saw fit to merge the Mandela Foundation with the Rhodes Foundation to form the Mandela Rhodes Foundation, which got a whopping R142 million from the Rhodes Trust.

The mission school Mandela attended received a grant from the Rhodes Trust, as did the University of Fort Hare, where he studied. At his treason trial Mandela was defended by a Rhodes Scholar, Bram Fischer.

Rhodes, the colonial racist, donated millions to worthy causes and funded the university attended by these sanctimonious students. Statues and trusts can be removed, but not history.

Talk about looking a gift horse in the mouth.