Critic Te Ārohi recently received a tip from a café worker at St David Café, who was allegedly
asked to remove posters put up by Otago Students for Justice In Palestine (OSJP) on the 22nd of April. The employee told Critic that café workers were asked to remove the posters, having been told by “someone above” that the posters “incited violence”.
The poster, titled “Otago Uni In Bed With US-Israeli Cyber Warfare!”, encouraged students to endorse the following statement via QR code: “Otago University management has partnered with US/Israeli cyber warfare firm ‘Palo Alto Networks’. Blindsiding students and staff, management have compromised our institution’s responsibility to maintain the highest ethical standards. Our long standing demands for disentanglement from the Israeli war machine have
been blatantly disregarded. We do not support Israel’s genocidal regime – this makes us complicit in it. We, the students, do not consent to this partnership and reject it wholeheartedly.”
In response to the allegation, a University spokesperson told Critic that University union management had reviewed the matter, and found that a “misunderstanding” occurred following a “request for posters to be removed from tables inside St David Café, as these are not approved locations for posters.” As a result of the misunderstanding, some posters were also removed from the nearby noticeboard in St David’s, where posters are allowed to be displayed.
“We apologise for this error,” the spokesperson said to Critic. “Those posters have since been replaced and are currently displayed on the St David’s noticeboard.”
When asked if the University would ever direct staff to remove posters such as OSJP’s for reasons of “inciting violence”, a spokesperson explained that posters would only be removed if they breach “University regulations”, contain “illegal, defamatory or harmful content”, or are “not placed on an official noticeboard.”
When approached for comment, OSJP confirmed that they had been in comms with the University regarding their postering in the past, understanding that the Uni “doesn't allow posters anywhere except a handful of specific notice boards”. “We view this as being needlessly suffocating to cultural and political life on campus,” they explained to Critic. They said that while they were aware of their posters being taken down in non-designated spaces, they felt that removal from designated areas would be an “egregious attack on free speech” on campus that “should be opposed.”
In terms of a potential accusation of their posters “inciting violence”, OSJP were quick in shutting that suggestion down, pointing to the purpose of the poster being to “inform students about management partnering with a firm deeply involved in Israel and its genocidal, settler-colonial project”, and inviting students who oppose this to sign their name in declaration. “In fact, this declaration has been signed by hundreds of individual students so far, as well as OUSA,” OSJP continued. While unsubstantiated, OSJP felt that if “inciting violence” was a reason for removal, it would be not only “ridiculous”, but a “thinly veiled crackdown on student dissent.”
OSJP noted that the misunderstanding had come at a time when the University had “yet to condemn the atrocities being committed by Israel against Palestinians”, and was in a highly scrutinised partnership with Palo Alto Networks. Announced last week, Grant Robertson wrote to the OUSA student Executive that this partnership would be “review[ed]”.
