Sparks of varsity unrest flickering:

THERE is bound to be a few jitters among Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University’s (NMMU) management following this weekend’s petrol bombing of a building on south campus.

Given the intensity of last year’s student fee protests, the immediate concern is whether this signals the resumption of those events which shut down the university and saw the reorganisation of exams off-campus.

On Saturday night, vandals lit two petrol bombs inside NMMU’s procurement office and defaced the exterior with graffiti.

The spray-painted slogans called for an end to paid tuition as well as the downfall of the ANC and President Jacob Zuma.

Unsurprisingly, because of this, police suspicion has fallen on members of the #FeesMustFall movement. Hopefully, investigations will winkle out the culprits and determine the affiliation or otherwise of those involved.

In the meantime the university has responded by enhancing security, a perfectly reasonable move that will, however, come at additional cost.

Herein lies some of the irony.

The arson attack, if indeed motivated by the cause for free education, will increase the pall of suspicion on university, hardly an environment contiguous with an academic institution meant to promote the ideals of free movement, free association and freedom of thought.

But management has a duty to keep students, staff and visitors safe. This they will do at greater cost – and at a crucial point in time as fee debt threatens to collapse the entire edifice.

Parents, too, will be fretting. Who can blame them?

This latest criminal act will surely propel the government to put in place a set of contingencies for the year, if it has not done so already.

The academic year heads into only its second week, while the February re-examinations conclude on Friday.

Any delays could spell disaster for 2017 and nobody needs this.

However, unless Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan throws a surprising cash lifeline to universities, it is doubtful little will change.

The early sparks of a new confrontation appear to have been lit. We have to wonder who has the magic water to douse it.