Rhodes statue removed in Cape Town as crowd celebrates

The campaign to remove the statue was also about tackling continued racial inequality

South Africa’s University of Cape Town (UCT) has removed a statue of British colonialist Cecil Rhodes that had become the focus of protests.

The monument, taken down in front of cheering protesters, will be stored for “safe keeping”, UCT’s council said.

Students have been campaigning for the removal of the statue of the 19th Century figure, unveiled in 1934.

Other monuments to colonial-era leaders have also been the target of protest in South Africa.

The BBC’s Mohammed Allie told Focus On Africa radio that there was a “festive atmosphere” as students, academics, members of political parties and ordinary Cape Town residents came to witness a “historic moment for South Africa”.

The crowd cheered as the statue was being lifted of its plinth. Once it was removed some students jumped on it and started hitting it with wooden sticks and covering the face with plastic.

When the crane removed the Cecil Rhodes statue, it was a huge victory for black South Africans fed up with a lack of education and job opportunities more than 20 years after apartheid ended.

“We finally got the white man to sit down and listen to us,” said a student who had campaigned for it to be taken down. Some were chanting “one settler; one bullet” – a sign that anger could boil over if the lives of black people do not improve.

There was a mixed crowd watching – with many white academics and students also supporting its removal.

But the whole affair serves as a wake-up call to South Africans to tackle racial inequality. People point to the fact that at the University of Cape Town there are only five black South African-born professors.

© BBC