Racial Profiling At The University Of Manchester

The University of Manchester has come under severe scrutiny over the course of the last month due to an alleged incident of racial profiling against a student attempting to enter their student accommodation. Footage released on social media on November 15th shows a security guard detaining a student against a wall while demanding to see a form of identification. The student in question is 19-year-old Zac Adan – and students, staff, parents, and the general public are horrified at how Adan was treated during this incident.

In the video, Adan can be heard saying, “I am a student of the University of Manchester! They’re trying to snatch my card out of me. You see, I take this as racial profiling.” Witnesses at the scene also claim that the security guards did not give Adan a chance to properly identify himself before seizing him. Instead, Adan was cited as being involved in some of the alleged “drug dealing” occurring on campus. The footage shows Adan and his friends protesting against how they were treated by the security guards, who walk off after reviewing his university identification. One security guard tells Adan, “When you showed your card, you covered your face up – that’s all.” Another of Adan’s friends, however, said he had been “pinned against a wall 10 metres from his flat because he looked like a “drug dealer.” Other members of staff allegedly told Adan not to “play the race card.” This is ludicrous, given the security guard’s actions in the first place. It is difficult to assume that Adan was being targeted as a result of anything other than race.

The University of Manchester prides itself on its reputation as a prestigious Russell Group university. The school has launched an investigation into the incident, and has suspended the security officer that was involved as well. However, this is not the only time that the university has found itself in the spotlight this month. The school has been fiercely criticized over how it has handled coronavirus restrictions, which resulted in a protest involving hundreds of students in early November. The University of Manchester has apologized and launched a review into its decision to install metal fencing around the Fallowfield accommodation, at a cost of £11,000. “This university needs to do better,” says one student staying in Fallowfield. “First we’re locked in like animals, and now we’re being stereotyped and physically assaulted outside our own flats, that we are paying to live in, by the people that are paid to keep us safe.”

Anti-racism campaigners, already angry at how the coronavirus restrictions were handled, are calling for the vice-chancellor of Manchester University to resign after Adan’s experience. Dozens of students joined a protest at the university’s Fallowfield campus on November 16th. Nahella Ashraf, the chair of Manchester Stand Up to Racism, said on November 17th that the only reason the security guard stopped Adan was because Adan is black. Ashraf said she was aware of other students who had been similarly stopped while walking around their buildings’ halls and urged them to come forward in a bid to publicly address a problem that the university has been guilty of too many times.

“It sends a clear message,” Ashraf said, “that this university and the people employed by the university – the security firm – see black people as the other, that they don’t belong on campus. That is just unacceptable. … I think I speak for lots of people, not just across this city but the parents of the students stuck in this campus, to say that we think [Vice-Chancellor Nancy Rothwell] should step down,” she added. “She is not fit to do the job she is doing.”

The University of Manchester is home to many international students, who make up over 11,000 of the university’s overall 40,000 population. As a university, Manchester has a responsibility to instill both a comforting and welcoming atmosphere for both existing and prospective students. The school’s official motto is “Cognitio Sapientia Humanitas” (“Knowledge, Wisdom, and Humanity”). It should be the university’s priority to set an example for what they desire to preach.

Ruth Foran

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