Covid19 Vaccine Mandates: University of the Free State Hit With Legal Action by Solidarity

• Solidarity has motioned to take legal action against the University of the Free State due to its Covid-19 vaccine mandate
• The union said that the mandate does not align with human rights and has resulted in Solidarity receiving over 300 requests from staff and students
• Solidarity is concerned that the mandate will result in unvaccinated staff and students being fired and excluded

BLOEMFONTEIN - Solidarity, a trade union, has motioned legal action against the University of the Free State (UFS) due to its Covid-19 vaccine mandate.

Connie Mulder, a union representative, said that the mandate does not align with human rights and has resulted in Solidarity receiving over 300 requests from staff and students who need legal advice on the matter.

“We have been against mandatory vaccinations from the very start, saying quite frankly that it’s not necessary to get a vaccination programme.

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"It simply won’t work and that is why we are now approaching the courts to get legal certainty about what is the status of mandatory vaccinations,” Mulder said.

Solidarity's court case against UFS

Solidarity has requested that UFS review its vaccine mandate and encourage it to lift it. The trade union also claims that before a vaccine mandate is implemented, a risk analysis needs to take place, which the UFS did not do, Jacaranda FM reports.

Anton van der Bijl, the head of solidarity's legal department, said that not conducting the risk analysis means UFS has contravened the Occupational Health and Safety Act. In addition, Van der Bijl argued that the university has other options to minimise the risk of Covid-19 infection besides instituting a vaccine mandate.

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According to SABC News, Solidarity is concerned that the mandate will result in unvaccinated staff and students being fired and excluded. The trade union expressed that other institutions should not do so until the government has implemented its vaccine mandate.

Reactions to Solidarity vs UFS

@umtapi believes:

"Solidarity and AfriForum are fixing the country."

@thatomokoena44 remarked:

"They will win."

@hlals22 said:

"One of these days we’re going to wake up to the news of the University of the Free State being a social experiment and that we should go to real unis to redo our qualifications."

@pm_breakfxst04 shared:

"Stand up for your rights."

UKZN technical glitch sends acceptance letters to rejected applicants

A technical glitch on the University of KwaZulu-Natal (UKZN)'s system resulted in rejected students accidentally receiving firm acceptance offers via e-mail. The university apologised to these applicants and sent them SMSes to withdraw their firm acceptance offers.

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“Dear applicant, you may have received a firm offer letter via email today, please note this was due to a technical error and your status remains unsuccessful. Our apologies for the inconvenience this has caused,” UKZN wrote in their SMS.

This has disappointed applicants who had been excited to start their 2022 academic year at the university. This glitch occurred mainly to those who had applied to the Howard Campus.

Source: Briefly News