Four Rhodes University students were given bail of R8 000 in total between them at the Grahamstown Magistrate’s Court yesterday.
Four Rhodes University students were given bail of R8 000 in total between them at the Grahamstown Magistrate’s Court yesterday.
The students were arrested on Tuesday 25 October for public violence on campus. State Prosecutor Lyle Prins explained that they had discussed with the defence that accused number one, Lungisa Ningiza, has one pending case of a similar nature, hence his
bail has been set at R5 000.
The other three students were given R1 000 bail each. The court was packed with students who came to give support to the four. Ningiza was arrested for the second time since the fees protests started.
The first time he was released on warning with a group of other students. Among his bail conditions was that he should not participate in any unlawful protest on campus.
“You will now come back to the court on 30 November and if you fail to do so I will issue a warrant of arrest,” said magistrate Lindelwa Figlan yesterday. On Wednesday afternoon, a statement on the university’s Student Representative Council Facebook page stated that there were no more funds to pay bail for arrested students.
“We have run out of bail money funds. We need to start raising more money for the students that have been arrested over the past two days. We are appealing to students to please fundraise and to spread the word for assistance (Social Media),” read the statement.
Since the #FeesMustFall protests started, students have been arrested and initially they were released on warning. But lately, the court has been asking for bail for them before they were released. On Friday 21 October, a second-year law student, Luzuko Brian Naki, was granted bail of R5 000 at the magistrate’s court in Grahamstown.
Naki allegedly also violated his bail conditions and that was the reason he was asked to pay that much for bail. After the R5 000 bail, Naki was asked to report to the Grahamstown Police Station every second day.
Last week another nine students who were arrested were asked to pay R1 000 bail each.
The total amount that has been paid to bail the students so far is R22 000. It is not clear where the money comes from.
