Students in the blockade call on people to come to Novi Pazar on December 21. The reason is the situation at the State University of Novi Pazar (DUNP), as more than 200 students have lost their status, and about 30 professors have lost their jobs. The people of Novi Pazar are seeking support from the rest of Serbia. Yesterday, support arrived from only one opposition party.
DUNP is the only faculty in a physical blockade. If you ask the students, it will remain so until forced administration is introduced. Giving up is not an option. However, because they had the “guts” to say what was happening at this faculty, as they put it, they were met with revenge from the Rector.
“That is the Rector who publicly supported Aleksandar Vučić in Ćaciland. That is the Rector who said that political activity is forbidden at the university. She stated on the DUNP website that she supported Aleksandar Vučić’s list,” says student Dina Mehović.
This student explains for N1 that the DUNP website “serves up” information that everything is functioning “great,” but that, in the opinion of the students, this university is endangered. Students are losing statuses, and professors are losing jobs.
“What is written on the website—that the professors who were fired technically left on their own—is not true. What about the professors from Novi Pazar who were fired or whose contracts were not extended? We have examples where a second enrollment period was not given. We have colleagues who enrolled, and yet again received deregistration notices. They were informed that they lost student status,” says Mehović.
The DUNP administration states that a university with more than 3,000 students and thirty accredited study programs “cannot be shut down.”
The statement published on the DUNP website claims that “almost all teachers and associates who lost their jobs in the last three years left the university of their own free will.” And that only those students who did not want to renew the year lost their status.
Professor Biljana Stojković says that Novi Pazar is the center of what Serbia should be.
“Here we see an attack on freedom, a community that has shown it understands what Serbia should be—a multi-ethnic Serbia that loves its state. The students have shown us what constitutional patriotism means,” said Stojković.
Although DUNP has been in blockade for more than ten months, the local population, in the opinion of the students, seems to have fallen asleep.
“The local community should have been the first to show up and do something for this university.”
“The people, like these children, are trying to do something. Everyone else is keeping their distance.”
“Everyone is tired. Of rallies and walks.”
Nevertheless, DUNP students are calling citizens to a new gathering on December 21 in Novi Pazar. They are seeking support from the rest of Serbia, with the current feeling that they have been left alone.
MORE TOPICS:
Source: N1, Photo: Elmedin Hajrovic / ATAImages