Cecil John looking nervous at hallowed Oxford too
JOHANNESBURG : The Rhodes Must Fall (RMF) campaign at Oxford has sparked both interest and controversy in South Africa and the UK.
Earlier this year, major debates surrounding colonial statues in South Africa resulted in the removal of the Cecil John Rhodes statue from UCT. The movement recently gained traction in the UK.
Yesterday, the Cape Times’s sister paper The Star spoke exclusively with organising member Sizwe Mpofu-Walsh, son of National EFF chairman Dali Mpofu, about the movement in England and why it was established.
“RMF Oxford is a movement to decolonise the curriculum, iconography and demographic profile of the University of Oxford.
“We call ourselves Rhodes Must Fall because Rhodes is symbolic of the change needed. Many other things must fall too.”
Mpofu-Walsh said that it was important for racial marginalisation to end, and that questions of male supremacy must also be addressed, including the marginalisation of the LGBTQ community.
“Rhodes is a metaphor for the fact that the university is not a fully inclusive space.”
Although it’s only weeks old, the movement has made ripples in the media, both in the UK and internationally.
“It has drawn students from countries such as Canada, New Zealand, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Namibia and the US,” said Mpofu-Walsh.
“There are some South African students too, but it is by no means a South African movement.”
Mpofu-Walsh said the movement was inspired by the “Rhodes Must Fall” and “Open Stellenbosch” campaigns at UCT and Stellenbosch universities.
Through this, RMF Oxford members began educating themselves on Rhodes, and Oxford’s role in colonialism.
“Much of the design and implementation of British colonialism happened at Oxford.
“We also realised that if we could revolve our campaign around a central metaphor – that of Rhodes – we could achieve more than if we tackled multiple issues in an unconnected way.”
Asked what the movement hopes to achieve, Mpofu-Walsh said they want to start a critical conversation at Oxford about the university’s implication in colonial violence.
“We also want Oxford to improve its representation of ‘black voices’. For instance, the university only accepted 24 black British undergraduates this year, and there is not one black senior professor at the University.
“We want the (university’s) curriculum to focus on the whole world, not just Europe, or the US. And, finally, we want Oxford’s iconography to be reappraised,” he said.
With regards to the statues and iconography around the university, Mpofu-Walsh said that they ultimately want the university to perform an audit of the whole space, and to take steps to make its iconography more inclusive.