COVID-19: UJ students protest at Auckland Park campus against vaccine mandate

University of Johannesburg (UJ) students have on Thursday staged a protest at the Auckland Park campus in Johannesburg against the institution’s vaccine mandate.

UJ’s vaccine policy requires all staff and students to be fully vaccinated to gain access to all its campuses and facilities.

Students said this violated their right to bodily autonomy and called for the suspension of the mandate.

The university said it had to balance the individual right to bodily integrity, freedom of religion, belief or opinion against the collective right of the university community to health and safety when deciding on its COVID-19 vaccine policy.

Simon Maluleke is one of the students protesting against the policy: “Even our Constitution does stipulate that each and every person in South Africa has a right to choose voluntarily, to give consent whether they want to be injected or not. The UJ policy undermines those rights.”

UJ is one of several tertiary institutions, including Wits and the Durban University of Technology, that have instituted mandatory vaccination policies in preparation for the return of staff and students to campuses.

-EWN

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