BY MATT RICH
MELBOURNE — On Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology's city campus, the Global Action club, which is building the May 1 (M1) protest at RMIT, is campaigning against the corporatisation of education.
Only two of the RMIT university council's 20 members are RMIT students and just three are RMIT staff. The others are either currently or were once in high positions in big business. The council is the body that makes the decisions about the functioning of the university.
Council members include former chief executive officer of Shell Australia, Roland Williams. In 1995, Shell was implicated in the execution of anti-Shell activist Ken Saro-Wiwa and nine other leaders of the Ogoni people in Nigeria. Saro-Wiwa was framed on murder charges and killed by the Nigerian military dictatorship. His real "crime" was to campaign against Shell's environmental destruction of the Ogoni people's land.
The Global Action club has actions highlighting Shell's atrocities. The first was a speak out outside the university council building during one of its meetings. The second was a lunch-time effigy-burning and speak out.
On March 22, the Global Action club held a public forum. Shell's presence on the university council is a reflection of the trend towards increased corporatisation of education, participants agreed. Resistance members proposed that the Global Action club call a student general meeting to demand that Williams and the other corporate representatives resign and be replaced by students and staff. This proposal was accepted and the meeting has been scheduled for April 5. The student general meeting will also discuss support for M1.
The Global Action club is also campaigning for free education. April 5 is the National Union of Students national day of action against the corporatisation of education. It will also have a speak out and effigy burning at lunchtime, followed by a "corporate scumbag tour" of big business sites in the city, including Shell.