SOUTH AFRICA’S communists vowed yesterday to defend riot-hit universities from “anarchy, violence and sheer destruction” for the rest of the academic year.

Their intervention came as “Fees Must Fall” protesters broke windows and doors and threw human excrement around buildings at the University of Cape Town in a bid to prevent it reopening in the wake of previous demonstrations.

The joint statement by the South African Communist Party (SACP) and Young Communist League (YCL-SA) followed a weekend summit in Benoni, east of Johannesburg.

The conference, held under the banner of the Right To Learn Campaign “for a working-class biased free higher education system,” was also attended by leaders of the South African Students Congress.

The SACP and YCL said they were “confident that the majority of the students have seen through the ugly face of the forces behind the destruction, violence and anarchy.”

They added: “It is important to note that at the core of this amorphous coalition is their common hatred of the SACP, its leadership and its role as the vanguard of the left forces in our country.”

In Johannesburg, students blocked a road in the morning rush hour and threw stones before returning to their hall of residence at the University of the Witwatersrand.

It was there that former student council president and Fees Must Fall leader Mcebo Dlamini was arrested early on Sunday as part of a probe into “recent violence, criminality and acts of intimidation.”