Hundreds of Wits students gathered on campus on Monday outside the FNB Building. Wearing black, they carried candles and signs representing the 148 victims of those killed in the attack on Garissa University College on 2 April. Some held Kenyan flags as they walked in silence and massed outside Wits Great Hall, where there was a moment of silence and the Kenyan national anthem was sung.

During the speeches, students and staff at the university emphasised the importance of African and international solidarity with their Kenyan peers. As Vice Chancellor Adam Habib put it, the terrorists violated the principle of human community. While African solidarity reigned on campus, the demonstration silently highlighted how desperately African solidarity needs to continue at home while foreigners are being attacked in Durban, following similar violence in Gauteng earlier this year.

“Today we are all Kenyans,” said Habib, noting the diversity of people who marched in solidarity for the nation. “The attack on Garissa students was an attack on humanity as a whole,” he said, while he emphasised the violation of the university as a safe space. “You violated the code of what it means to be a part of a common African identity and a common humanity.” In the crowd, students held signs displaying possible career ambitions of those who died.

African migrants have been attacked around Durban since late last month, forcing hundreds to seek refuge, causing multiple deaths and widespread looting of foreign-owned stores around KwaMashu, Umlazi, Isipingo and Chatsworth in the latest round of xenophobic attacks in the country. “This issue of xenophobia is not something that is limited to a specific ward and we see it now spreading to the whole of Durban,” Inkatha Freedom Party spokesperson Mdu Nkosi told News24, bringing the issue of African solidarity home.

According to Wits SRC President Mcebo Dlamini, students want to march next week against xenophobia to the South African Human Rights Commission and SAPS. The SRC will meet with Wits management on the proposal and Habib said the university is looking into a follow-up demonstration on the unacceptable attacks.

“It hurts me to stand here today and talk about the solidarity in Kenya when in my own backyard we are killing our brothers from Africa,” said Dlamini, who was born in exile in Mozambique, after the Garissa event finished. We all have a responsibility as South Africans, our politicians, our religious leaders. We have to talk about this. It is not only the responsibility of the government of Jacob Zuma but the responsibility of our journalists. We need revolutionary journalists. We need revolutionary artists, people who will sing against xenophobia,” he added. Dlamini condemned King Goodwill Zwelithini’s comments, blamed for inciting the attacks in Durban and called on him to apologise and address residents in the Durban townships to stop the violence.

“As long as we South Africans, when we look at ourselves, find as if we are ivory towers, we are better than other African countries, we are going nowhere. As long as we as South Africans view ourselves in the mind of the West, that we are the West of Africa, we are the superpower and all the other countries must bow to South Africa, we are going nowhere, because there’s no South Africa without Tanzania. There’s no South Africa without Rwanda. There’s no South Africa without Zimbabwe,” said Dlamini, emphasising economic ties and the refuge other countries offered South Africans in exile during Apartheid.

Chairperson of the African Diaspora Forum Marc Gbaffou welcomed the Wits march for the Garissa victims. “The whole idea of this solidarity is very good,” he said over the phone on Monday evening. But he cautioned that solidarity should be shown for Africans both outside and inside South Africa. “You’re living with people who are attacked. No one is saying anything. We want solidarity with these people,” said Gbaffou, hoping the Wits event signalled a celebration of all Africans. “Do you only support students or do you support the shopkeepers in Durban, the shopkeepers in Soweto? Do you support the migrants who are fighting for a daily life?” he asked.

While Wits University seems far from the epicentre of the xenophobic attacks and the students and staff far removed from the complex range of factors contributing to the violence, the success of the university’s action on Garissa displayed much-needed African solidarity. The country needs to confront, both at home and abroad, the present situation – and transform the political and social relationships which, when mixed with local problems, lead to bodies on the streets and asylum seekers chased from their places of refuge. DM