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Vol. 89 No.48 USPS 045360 10 Pages
College Station, Texas
Tuesday, November 7,1989
Care package from R.C.
Dan Debenport, a junior at Texas A&M and a football locker room before working out with the
member of the 12th Man kickoff team and Corps team Monday afternoon. The Aggies do not play
of Cadets, reaches for his practice jersey in the another game until Nov. 24.
Crowds pack E. German streets
iemanding free elections, travel
I BERLIN (AP) — A half-million
East Germans thronged the streets
oi Leipzig in a hard, cold rain Mon
day night to demand free elections
and unlimited freedom to travel
abroad.
I More than 135,000 people rallied
in other cities, including Schwerin,
d a ll e > Cottbus, Dresden and Karl-
darx-Stadt, the . news agency re
ined.
While East Germans at home pro
tested, mass flight continued. The
official news agency ADN said
23,200 citizens had gone to West
Germany since the suspension of
exit rules Saturday.
Lutheran Church sources said
some marchers in Leipzig shouted
“The Wall must go!” — demanding
demolition of the Berlin Wall, sym
bol of East German repression for
three decades.
hild shot at day care
onscious, improving
I Kenny Archer, the 3-year-old who
shot himself accidentally on Oct. 31
at a Normangee day care center, is
Bno longer on a ventilator and listed
Hn guarded condition, a spokesman
■or Texas Children’s Hospital in
Houston said Monday. A friend of
|the Archer family said that Kenny
Bvas conscious and showing im
provement. He said the doctors have
given Kenny a strong chance of sur
vival.
I Kenny shot himself above the
right eye with a .22-caliber pistol car
ried by Kenda Mahaffey as part of a
Halloween costume. Mahaffey, an
employee of the Twice As Nice Play
school, where the shooting occurred,
believed that the gun was unloaded.
Leon County Deputy Attorney
Tuck McLain said that Mahaffey was
indicted Friday morning by a Leon
County Grand Jury. Mahaffy was in
dicted on two third-degree felony
charges of reckless injury of a child
and unlawfully carrying a weapon
where prohibited. McLain said that
he expects Mahaffey will be ar
raigned Nov. 27, when the court
meets for its regular docket.
ADN said banners demanding
“Free elections” and “Travel law
without restrictions” waved above
the crowd, and others challenged
Communist Party supremacy.
It said “several hundred thou
sand” people took part in the biggest
rally so far in Leipzig, where some of
the largest protests of the pro-de
mocracy campaign have been held.
Michael Turek, a Lutheran pastor
in the southern industrial city of
650,000, said by telephone about
500,000 people marched. A rally
Saturday in East Berlin, where the
crowd was estimated at 1 million,
was the largest protest in the com
munist nation’s 40-year history.
Members of New Forum, the larg
est pro-reform group, addressed the
crowd in Leipzig, ADN said.
Dresden’s march was authorized
by authorities and led by Mayor
Wolfgang Berghofer and the re
form-minded local party chief, Hans
Modrow. ADN said it was the first
officially approved demonstration in
the city.
Earlier Monday, the government
published a new draft law that is ex
pected to take effect before
Christmas and will permit travel
abroad for up to 30 days a year.
Committee plans program
to slow drinking at bonfire
By Michael Kelley
Of The Battalion Staff
The Bonfire Subcommittee on Al
cohol Awareness and Safety is plan
ning to “Keep Alcohol From Shat
tering the Tradition” by
discouraging alcohol use at the bon
fire site. The group also hopes to de
crease the number of persons who
get drunk before going to watch the
burning of bonfire.
“The concern of a lot of people —
administration, community, stu
dents and former students — is that
in the past few years, due to the size
of bonfire, we’ve had an increased
problem with alcohol at the site, as
well as people coming to bonfire in
toxicated,” said Jo Hudson, coordi
nator of the Bonfire Subcommittee
on Alcohol Awareness and Safety.
Hudson, assistant to the vice pres
ident for student services, credits the
increase in number of persons at
bonfire to successful Aggie football
teams and the increasing student en
rollment at Texas A&M.
The biggest complaint against
bonfire has been from College Sta
tion residents who live across from
Duncan Field, Hudson said.
She said it is not from fear of their
homes catching fire from the bon
fire’s flying emoers, as bonfire lead
ers have been told in the past. The
residents are angry because bonfire
watchers loiter and leave trash, such
as beer cans and bottles, strewn
across yards in the community.
Hudson said if the situation is not
resolved, then there is a very good
ossibility future bonfires will not be
eld at its present site at Duncan
Field, but will be moved to one
where such problems will not create
these disturbances within the sur
rounding community.
A&M’s Office of Public Informa
tion has sent a release to all Texas
newspapers concerning alcohol
awareness at the site. The message
also is being printed on billboards
along roads leading to Bryan and
College Station, announced during
future A&M sporting events and yell
practices and spread by word-of-
mouth by leaders of student and fac
ulty organizations on the A&M cam
pus.
Hudson said she wants the sub
committee’s message to be a positive
one.
“I’m not here to tell people that
they shouldn’t go out and have a
party before bonfire or that they
shouldn’t go and have pizza and
beer before they arrive (at Duncan
Field); I don’t have a problem with
that at all,” Hudson said. “I do have
a problem with people who are un
manageable and bring alcohol to
bonfire, which is against University
regulations.
“We have, I think, eradicated al-
Rioters flock streets
to protest president
BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) — A
strike called by Gen. Michel Aoun,
the Christian army commander, vir
tually closed down east Beirut on
Monday and his followers filled the
streets to protest the election of a
Syrian-backed president.
Rioting Aoun loyalists stormed
the residence of Nasrallah Sfeir, the
Maronite Catholic patriarch, who
supported Rene Mouawad’s election
as president Sunday, and forced him
to kiss a portrait of the general.
Mouawad, 64, and Aoun, 54, are
Maronites, the main Christian sect in
Lebanon.
Aoun declared a “war of liber
ation” this year on the 40,000 Syrian
soldiers stationed in Lebanon under
a 1976 peacekeeping mandate from
the Arab League. He issued a
statement Monday urging support
ers to “limit your protests to civilized
and peaceful methods.”
Scnools, shops, restaurants, banks
and government offices closed in
Christian east Beirut and many parts
of the 310-square-mile Christian en
clave north and east of the city.
Patriarch Sfeir, 68, fled to his
summer home in an area of north
Lebanon under Syrian control and
said he would not return to his offi
cial residence on the wooded slopes
of Bkirki “until peace prevails.”
Lebanese police issued a
statement saying they “ensured the
patriarch’s safe drive” early Monday
to Diman, 52 miles north of Bkirki.
“We plead with God to forgive”
the attackers, Sfeir said at Diman,
where he was greeted by Mouawad,
Parliament speaker Hussein Hus-
seini, Arab League envoy Lakhdar
Ibrahimi of Algeria and many legis
lators.
A police spokesman said 100 sup
porters of Aoun drove to Bkirki in
30 cars after midnight Sunday and
stormed the walled compound. A
40-man unit of Aoun’s command as
signed to protect Sfeir did not try to
stop them, said the spokesman,
whose name was withheld under
standing regulations.
“The rioters broke into the patri
arch’s bedroom, dragged him out of
bed, forced him to kneel with two se
nior aides who rushed to help him
and forced them all to kiss posters of
Aoun,” the spokesman said.
Other Aoun loyalists broke into at
least six churches in the Christian
enclave to protest Mouawad’s elec
tion.
cohol from the cutting site and I
think we have eradicated it from the
construction on Duncan Field,”
Hudson said.
“This has been a very positive
move, but I think we want to go a
little bit further in trying to discour
age people from bringing alcoholic
beverages to the site on bonfire
night (Dec. 1) as well as discourage
them from coming in a state of in
toxication, in which they can’t take
care of themselves and are disrup
tive and a problem for everybody el
se,” Hudson continued.
Hudson said that any student in
terested in helping the subcommit
tee perform its task is welcome to at
tend the next meeting, which is
Monday, Nov. 13, at 5 p.m. in 208D
Pavilion. All student organizations
are encouraged to attend. For more
information contact Jo Hudson at
845-4728 or Anne Coombes at 845-
0280.
Silver Taps
ceremony
to honor 2
The solemn sound of buglers
playing “Taps” and the sharp
ring of gunfire will be heard on
campus tonight as two Texas
A&M students who died during
the past month are hon
ored in a Silver Taps
ceremony
at 10:30 in
front of the
Academic Build-
ing-
The deceased
students being hon
ored are:
• James Gregory Fo
ley, 33, a senior engi
neering technology ma
jor from Tomball who
died Oct. 22.
• Jan Ellen Hering,
22, a senior elementary education
major from McGregor who died
Oct. 22.
Dating back almost a century,
the stately tradition of Silver Taps
is practiced on the first Tuesday
of each month from September
through April, when necessary.
Lights will be extinguished and
the campus hushed as Aggies pay-
final tribute to fellow Aggies.
The Ross Volunteer Firing
Squad begins the ceremony,
marching in slow cadence toward
the statue of Lawrence Sullivan
Ross.
Shortly after, three volleys are
fired in a 21-gun salute and six
buglers play a special arrange
ment of “Taps” three times — to
the north, south and west.
nti-apartheid group ends rally in chancellor’s office
y Bob Krenek
f The Battalion Staff
Students Against Apartheid fol
lowed a rally at Rudder Fountain
Monday with a march to Texas
A&M University Chancellor Dr.
Perry Adkisson’s office, where they
left a signed statement of their posi-
ion after being turned away by a
iecretary and told the chancellor was
out of town.
A group of about 25 students
filled the waiting room of the exec
utive offices in the Systems Building
before being told that only the
group leaders could remain. The
president of SAA, Irwin Tang, read
from a poster board that said: “We,
the concerned students and faculty
of Texas A&M University, hereby
demand that Texas A&M Univer
sity, in order to promote human
rights and democracy in South Af
rica and Namibia, disinvest from all
firms doing business in South Afri
ca.”
Tang signed his name along with
other members of the group and in
cluded phone numbers after re-
ouesting that Adkisson call them to
discuss the University’s position on
divestment.
We left our names and numbers,
so he will call us if he cares at all,”
Tang said. “We have never actually
been able to talk to the chancellor,
although we have tried to make ap
pointments in the past.”
The rally began earlier with the
choral group Voices of Praise and
featured several anti-apartheid
speakers. They were offset by rep
resentatives from the College Re
publicans and Young Conservatives,
who oppose divestment as a method
of ending apartheid.
The student demonstrators were
encouraged by Dr. Larry Yarak, an
assistant professor of history at
A&M.
“I am very glad to see that your
moral consciousness has not been
lost in the midst of busy schedules
and school life,” Yarak said.
Yarak said he also supported the
continuation of efforts against the
South African government.
“We need to keep up the pres
sure,” he said. “We see the release of
a few prisoners, but 3,000 remain
behind bars. We see 70,000 South
Africans rallying against their gov
ernment, but they were all breaking
the law to do so.”
South Africa is beginning to re
spond to international pressure, Ya
rak said, but many of the govern
ment’s concessions are only
superficial.
“Pressure means sanctions,” Ya
rak said. “A&M must divest itself of
its holdings in South African compa
nies. That is the only thing the Pre-
torian regime will respond to.”
The next speaker was Chester
Wilson, one of the 16 anti-apartheid
demonstrators who were arrested
last year after staging a sit-in in the
University of Texas president’s of
fice. Wilson spent six months in jail
as a result of the incident.
One of the three main “lies spread
to prevent divestment,” Wilson said,
is that divestment will not work.
“Why would the South African
government make it against the law
to advocate divestment?” Wilson
asked. “The leadership knows the
importance of preventing divest
ment.”
The second misconception, Wil
son said, is that divestment would
hurt the companies with South Afri
can holdings.
“The UT regents said divestment
would hurt the university, but finan
cial management experts concluded
it would not hurt at all,” he said.
“The financial experts proved that
divestment stock portfolios outper
formed non-divestment portfolios.”
Regardless, Wilson said, it is not
wise to invest in a country as trou
bled as South Africa.
“To invest in an avowed Nazi state
— now that is risky,” he said. “The
prudent thing to do is to pull the
money out of there.”
The third lie is that divestment
would hurt the people of South Af
rica, Wilson said.
“The corollary to this is that we
should promote policies to combat
racism,” he said. “But this has been
tried and it failed miserably.
“We need to look at who does ad
vocate divestment, primarily the
people of South Africa,” he said.
“Every major organization in South
Africa makes this demand.”
The anti-apartheid fighters face a
difficult struggle, Wilson said, but
they must continue.
“They will only give us what we
fight for,” he said. “We have a diffi
cult road ahead but we have masses
of people and the momentum of his
tory on our side.”
Tang spoke last and proceeded to
criticize the U.S. government for its
lack of action in the apartheid issue.
“The present government is ex
tremely apathetic,” he said. “How
many of you really think George
Bush cares about the South African
people?
Members of Students Against Apartheid
Photo by Phelan M. Ebenhack
march to the chancellor’s office Monday.
“Bush can say what he wants but
he has done nothing for the South
African people,” he said. “We need a
change in government.”
The College Republicans and the
Young Conservatives set up a table
next to the anti-apartheid group be
cause they oppose views such as
these.
“Our purpose is not to make a
case for tne support of apartheid; we
think apartheid is reprehensible, but
we feel that divestment is not the
way to abolish it,” said Scott Kibb,
College Republicans chairman.
“We think that divestment
and
sanctions will upset the government
and lead to a revolution,” Kibb said.
See Rally/Page 5