Pictures of students sleeping in toilets 'staged': UP management
Pictures of University of Pretoria (UP) students sleeping in bathrooms and outside are staged, this is according to the varsity management.
Pictures have been circulating on social media showing students, allegedly without accommodation, sleeping inside toilets.According to the students, there is a residential area crisis as UP is unable to accommodate most of them.
The students also claimed that the residence issue is negatively impacting their studies and livelihood in general as they cannot afford to travel home after classes on a daily basis and are therefore forced to find sleeping spots in and around the campus.
"We have reason to believe that the pictures of students apparently without accommodation on social media have been staged," said media officer Candice Jooste.
The varsity went on to deny all allegations citing that some of the people shown in pictures are not registered students.
"Last night the University and the Temporary Student Committee engaged with a group of students who claimed to be without accommodation. We offered accommodation to all of them for the night but they refused."
"We have since discovered that out of the group of ten students, four were already placed in residences, three of them were not students and one had outstanding financial issues. The University was able to find permanent accommodation for the other two," she said.
Students also claimed that the university deployed security to remove all students sleeping on campus and that during the student removals on Monday evening, one heavily pregnant student was "repeatedly assaulted on Hatfield Campus by Fidelity Security as students who had no residence placement were sleeping in campus for shelter".
UP has since called for the student to lay an official complaint.
"We condemn all types of violence against students and staff and encourage the complainant to report the matter so that we can investigate."
Jooste said that student and parents alike must be aware that accommodation is limited and that only 15% of the student population could be accommodated.
"As it is in all higher education institutions in this country, official University residences have capacity to accommodate approximately 15% of the student body. For this reason, some of the key criteria used by the university in residence admission is academic eligibility, academic achievement, financial need and year of study with preference given to first years.
"The University is committed to and will do everything in its control to ensure that, within the limits of space available in our official residences, eligible students are assisted to find accommodation," explained Jooste.
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