A South African university have removed the statue of a British colonialist in response to student protests. Demonstrators, known as the Rhodes Must Fall Movement, have described Cecil Rhodes as a mass murderer, who stole indigenous land. The movement has sparked a wave of similar protests in which apartheid-era statues have been vandalised.
The statue at the university, one of Africa’s top academic institutions, has been covered up for the past few weeks as both white and black students regularly marched past with #Rhodesmustfall placards calling for its removal.
The statue is believed to be a symbol of the racism against blacks that prevails in South Africa two decades after the end of oppressive white-minority rule.
The demonstrations have triggered similar reactions elsewhere, with a statue outside parliament of Afrikaner Boer war hero and former prime minister of the Union of South Africa, Louis Botha, vandalised with paint.
South Africans have reacted differently, others felt the removals symbolised the removal of part of the country’s history, while others could not justify them.
Are there similar statues in your country? Do the statues have relevance to your society today?
