BREAKING: DASO takes NMMU SRC

[caption id="attachment_100913" align="alignright" width="300"] LAST CALL: Vociferous and colourful supporters at the busy NMMU Missionvale campus are, from left, Yondela Hlunza (Daso), Nozipho Qwesha (Sasco) and Milisa Mbotya (EFFSC). Picture: EUGENE COETZEE[/caption]

The Democratic Alliance Student Organisation (DASO) has retained control of the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University Student Representative Council for 2016.

Thousands of excited students cast their ballots yesterday in a highly contested SRC election which also mirrored the political forces in Nelson Mandela Bay.

The voting followed weeks of campaigning which saw some of the country’s most powerful politicians from all three parties coming to campaign.

At lunchtime yesterday, snaking queues formed at Missionvale campus as students lined up to vote, each for a party they believed would best represent them.

They cheered and clapped as political party leaders visited the voting stations.

Management student Siphosihle Bam, 23, had Daso stickers all over her face.

She said only under the DA Student Organisation would the Missionvale campus receive the attention students wanted from management.

She said students at that campus were led by the ANC’s student organisation Sasco and she claimed they were elected not because they were capable of delivering but because they were popular on campus. “My main concern is about our site representative from Sasco who is based in the Second Avenue campus,” Bam said.

“How are they supposed to represent us when they do not know our everyday challenges?” she asked.

Meanwhile, Sasco member and marketing student at the Second Avenue campus, Phumeza Ntsomi, 28, said her organisation was the only one that listened and addressed students’ needs.

Business studies student Sinethemba Plaatjie, 20, said the Missionvale campus had been described as the “dump site” of NMMU.

-Siphokuhle Mkancu