UCLA Protest on Apartheid Takes Form of Mock Funeral

About 75 anti-apartheid protesters at UCLA, calling on Chancellor Charles Young to oppose University of California investments in firms that do business in South Africa, carried coffins in a mock funeral procession through the campus Tuesday to commemorate blacks slain by South African authorities.

More than 50 of the students have been camped out for two weeks in tents pitched on a lawn outside the campus administration building. A tiny pseudo cemetery on the lawn contains flimsy wooden crosses splattered with red paint and marked with the names of blacks who have died at the hands of South African police.

The demonstrators, moving in silence to the beat of a drum, filed through a job placement center and circled a group of ROTC cadets dressed in combat fatigues before reaching Young’s office to present a list of “demands.”

Young, however, was out of the country on business, and protesters found themselves reading their statement to Assistant Vice Chancellor Michael T. McManus, who is in charge of public communications. McManus promptly promised to deliver them to Young and left the protesters as they bowed their heads in a moment of silent prayer.

Three Demands

The protesters called on Young to withdraw all UCLA funds from banks that do business with South Africa, to “pressure” the UC Board of Regents to relinquish investments in all such firms and to drop trespassing charges lodged late last month against 21 protesters who refused to leave a sit-in at the administration building.

The funeral procession was peaceful, marked by tension only when protesters confronted the ROTC cadets. A woman protester turned to them and screamed, “Get those smiles off your faces. Apartheid is no joke. You want your mothers killed?”

The cadets, who had been seated on a lawn outside the ROTC building, quickly moved inside, leaving behind the leaflets the protesters had dropped on their laps. “Why are they interrupting us--just because we’re ROTC?” asked one irritated cadet.

Most passers-by ignored the procession. A secretary in the job placement center curled her lips in disgust when demonstrators dropped leaflets on her desk. The secretary, her glasses hanging on a chain around her neck, shooed them aside with her hand. “You’re being disruptive, coming in here,” she complained.

Protest organizers acknowledged that they may themselves be using products produced by the firms whose ties with the university they want to cut. For example, organizers said they did not know whether they were copying their leaflets and lists of demands on Xerox machines. Ingrid Landes, 21, preparing a placard on the tent-covered lawn, said, “We’ve been trying to ban Coke in this area.” Xerox and Coca-Cola are among the companies protesters have targeted for divestment.

Last week, UCLA protesters marched through Westwood and several withdrew their money from banks believed to be doing business with South Africa. The protesters are planning to go to Berkeley next week to attend a Board of Regents meeting in which the investment controversy will be taken up. The regents are scheduled to vote on the issue in June.

Meanwhile, sit-ins continued on the UC Berkeley campus despite temporary pullouts by five student groups.

Demonstrations have been winding down for several weeks as students began preparing for final examinations--and for protests to be staged during the May 16-17 Board of Regents meeting at Berkeley.

Nonetheless, more than 100 protesters spent Monday night and Tuesday morning on the steps of Sproul Hall, and 27 people, including two students and 12 members of various Berkeley city commissions, were cited Tuesday for blocking access to the school’s administration building.

Thus far, 483 people have been arrested on the Berkeley campus in anti-apartheid demonstrations over the last 28 days.

In La Jolla on Tuesday, about 900 to 1,000 students attended a noon rally at UC San Diego held in conjunction with a planned boycott of classes.

It was difficult to tell exactly how many students boycotted the 1,200 classes that are normally held on Tuesday because instructors do not keep attendance records, said Registrar Ron Browker.

Midterm examinations are also in progress, Browker said, and some instructors may have canceled classes to allow students to work on research papers or to participate in study groups.

115 Students Camping

About 115 students are still camping in front of the Cluster Undergraduate Humanities Library each night, according to Matthew Cronin, opinion editor for the student newspaper, the Guardian, and one of the organizers of the anti-apartheid movement.

The students will continue their nightly vigils until May 15, Cronin said. Then they will travel to Berkeley where students from other university campuses plan to demonstrate at a meeting of the Board of Regents, Cronin said.