Student Activism Still Alive on Campus

Student activists are reacting to non-activist university student councils that are continuously withdrawing from the Korean University Student Council Union, also known as Hanchongryun.

Starting with the impeachment of Seoul National University’s student council president Hwang Na-yol on June 13 by student activists, seven college student councils of Dankook University have decided to urge for the resignation of student council president Bae Sung-soo, 24, a computer science major student who agreed to the relocation of the university.

Seven out of the 11 college student councils participated in the Emergency Committee to Normalize Dankook University and announced on June 13, “We have received signatures from 2,500 students demanding the resignation of the Dankook University Student Council president, and after holding an official press conference on June 14, we plan to urge Bae to resign.”

Dankook University committee’s superficial reason for resignation is the student council’s irresponsibility in carrying out its promises. They argue that the current student council was elected by promising to cancel plans to move Dankook University’s Seoul Campus to Suji, Gyeonggi Province, but they did not keep that promise and accepted the university’s demand to relocate the campus.

A student of the committee said, “Our goal is to receive 5,000 signatures, which is the majority of the total students, demanding for the resignation of the university student council president, then neutralize the current student council and afterwards the emergency committee will play the role of the student council.”

In response, Bae refuted, “Although I did not keep my promise, I had to seek alternatives since canceling the relocation was legally impossible. The activist student council opposed the relocation for over 10 years, but in reality nothing has changed.”

He added, “It is regretful that I can’t tune in to the same tone with activist college student councils since I am a non-activist student council president. There are views that the impeachment of the Seoul National University student council president was to eliminate non-activists, but I hope that is not true.”

ditto@donga.com