BY GREG ROSENBERG
WASHINGTON, D.C. - "We can come here and stand every day, and nothing will happen. We have to step on some toes," said student protester Xolani Malawana. On February 26, Malawana joined nearly 5,000 other students in the streets of Johannesburg - the largest student march since South Africa's first nonracial elections in 1994 - sponsored by the South African Students Congress (SASCO). Marchers culminated their boisterous protest outside the Johannesburg Stock Exchange.

The students were joined in a sympathy picket by professors, administrators, and other staff who held signs reading "Education is a right! Subsidy cuts are a blight." Students hoped to present their demands to Finance Minister Trevor Manuel of the ANC, but he did not show up.

SASCO leaders say that the ANC-led government's proposed budget would have sacrificed education for thousands of students, to the demands of fiscal discipline.

While the gains of the mass struggle to bring down the apartheid regime were registered over the past two years in the establishment of a unitary system of nonracial public education, there has been little change so far in the devastated conditions of many schools. Moreover, university level education remains blocked off for the vast majority of black students, who cannot afford the fees.

A wave of student protests since the beginning of January forced South African Education Minister Sibusiso Bengu to announce March 6 that the funds allocated for student subsidies would be increased to just below the level of last year. The Finance Ministry's preliminary budget for the upcoming fiscal year had proposed a drop in student loans from 300 million rand to 250 million rand ($1= approximately 4.5 rand).

SASCO deputy president Kenny Diseko announced March 10 that the student federation, which has been an important component of the revolutionary democratic movement led by the ANC, would join workers from the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) in a march on Parliament in Cape Town on March 12. The trade union federation had earlier announced the demonstration to press the government to speed implementation of the Reconstruction and Development Program, a document outlining provision of basic services to millions of black South Africans disenfranchised under apartheid rule.

Diseko said student marchers would focus their demands on withdrawal of charges against students engaging in peaceful protest and for funding to settle outstanding fees.

Student protests led by SASCO and other organizations have taken place at the University of the Witswatersrand, the Wits and Pretoria tecknikons, the University of KwaZulu- Natal, and the University of the North. The University of Fort Hare in the Eastern Cape was closed March 11 after student protests against payment of outstanding tuition fees. The vice-chancellor gave students less than a day's warning to vacate the campus with their belongings.

Students at the Bosele School for the Blind in the Northern Province evicted their principal on March 6, saying he had misused funds.

SASCO protests were successful in forcing some institutions to submit to demands that all students be registered regardless of their finances.

The University of Port Elizabeth agreed to a moratorium on excluding students who could not pay their fees, and the University of the Free State extended payment deadlines to June 30. In the third week of March, SASCO plans to organize protests at the Afrikaans-language universities -Stellenbosch, University of the Free State, Rand Afrikaans University and University of Potchefstroom.

In other news, ANC president Nelson Mandela added his voice to those calling for the names of alleged collaborators with the apartheid regime to be disclosed.

The Truth Commission, which is hearing testimony on apartheid-era crimes, had earlier ruled that the names of some apartheid-era police informers could not be revealed. Certain police applying for amnesty before the commission have asserted that some of their former informers are now ANC government officials.  
 
 
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