PROF. MANDLA MAKHANYA, PRINCIPAL AND VICE CHANCELLOR
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH AFRICA
THABO MBEKI PRESIDENTIAL LIBRARY
ANNOUNCEMENT: 16 September 2014
Programme Director
The Patron of the Thabo Mbeki Foundation and former president of the Republic of South Africa, his Excellency, Thabo Mbeki
The Chairperson of Unisa Council, Dr Mathew Phosa and Council Members present
The Chairperson of the Thabo Mbeki Foundation, Dr Brigalia Bam and Trustees of the Foundation present
The Executive Management of Unisa
The head of the Thabo Mbeki African Leadership Institute, Professor Vusi Gumede and your colleagues
The Executive Director of the Unisa Library, Dr Mbambo-Thata
Members of the Diplomatic Corps
Members of the media
Unisa Staff Members
Unisa Student leadership and students
Distinguished audience
On a historic occasion like this one it is proper to invite the very words of Mr Thabo Mbeki, the former President of South Africa, when he eloquently said
“It is not given to every generation that it should be present during and participate in the act of creation. I believe that ours is privileged to occupy such historic space.”
He was referring to the historic epoch-marking birth of South African democracy after protracted home-grown political negotiations but this has relevance, twenty years later, to the current event of announcing and introducing the Thabo Mbeki Presidential Library which will be hosted by Unisa. As we stand here we are witnessing history in the making and there are many midwives who have been toiling in the labour ward to make this dream a reality.
My memory flashes back to the time when we made a conscious strategic choice of entering into partnership with the Thabo Mbeki Foundation, something which has since yielded a number of world acclaimed flagship programmes and institutions. Here I single out the Thabo Mbeki African Leadership Institute (TMALI) as well as the Thabo Mbeki Annual Memorial Lecture that has attracted a galaxy of world leaders particularly those from the African continent. This strategic partnership had an organic and natural link to our strategy and vision of being “An African University in the service of humanity.” TMALI and the Africa Day Memorial Lecture Series have lifted the profile of this great university into a higher pedestal in the global higher education arena. This affirms the fact that this was the best strategic choice that Unisa leadership took even at the time when the benefits of this chosen path was not immediately appreciated nor understood. Today Unisa has, arguably, the greatest concentration of Africa-focused programmes and institutes compared to any other university in South Africa.
History is beginning to vindicate the strategic choice we made as the milestone of introducing the Thabo Mbeki Presidential Library adds another jewel into our academic crown. I would like to thank the Chairperson of Unisa Council, Dr Mathews Phosa, and council members as they have always supported and even guided the strategic choices we made. In essence Unisa Council has always been the wind beneath our wings hence we soar ever so higher in this moment of glory. The launch of this library marks the fulfilment of one of the central pillars of the collaboration between UNISA and the Thabo Mbeki Foundation. A promise was made when we entered into our collaboration and today we have come to report to this nation, to Africa and the world that a promise has been kept as a sacred covenant.
Unashamedly African, as borne out in its vision to be the African university in service of humanity, Unisa is ideally positioned to be a centre for engagement with African ideas, as evidenced in the fact that that Unisa is the home of the Thabo Mbeki African Leadership Institute (TMALI), the Archie Mafeje Research Institute for Social Policy and a number of other institutes whose goal is the transformation of South Africa and the Continent, through the time honoured intellectual pursuits of research and discourse.
Of course, Unisa’s library is one of the “jewels on our crown” as it were. Visitors to our facilities seldom fail to express their awe of our well-established and resourced library, little realising that we also have ten branch libraries, two mobile libraries serving students in the most remote areas of our country (and another five in the pipeline), a comprehensive library postal service, state-of-the-art online services, more than 2, 8 million library items, 103,000 e-books and 91,000 e-journal titles. I am sure that you will agree with me that the Thabo Mbeki collection has found the perfect home!
Our relentless quest for an Africa-focused university and knowledge systems is informed by the need to give Africans a voice and space to reflect on their condition while contemplating the future. It is the belief that endogenous knowledge systems will yield cognitive justice for a meaningful epistemological plurality that will position us to engage in a dialogue with other civilization on equal terms. The founding president of Botswana, President Seretse Khama captures the essence of our collective aspiration when he, in his address at the University of Botswana, Lesotho and Swaziland (UBLS) in 1970, asserted that:
“ It should now be our intention to try to retrieve what we can of our past. We should write our own history books to prove that we did have a past, and that it was a past that was just worth writing and learning about as any other. We must do this for the simple reason that a nation without a past is a lost nation, and a people without a past is a people without a soul.”
The Thabo Mbeki Presidential Library will become a repository of official and private papers of political leaders in African countries. This will reclaim the space that other universities from outside the African continent have always done that making their access and ownership a challenge. This library is an effort of making sure that Africans in future do not have to leave the continent incurring all kinds of expenses trying to access what is essentially their heritage. This epistemic alienation must be confronted and ended through efforts like these. This library will become an epicentre of literature on the African Renaissance.
In the history of South Africa, Mr Thabo Mbeki has occupied a very unique position during the exile liberation struggle years, in the inception of political negotiations with the apartheid regime, being in close proximity and interacting with the iconic OR Tambo, during the South African political negotiations and in the establishment of foundations of a new democratic South Africa as well as in the establishment of the African Union with all the peace negotiations that still preoccupy Mbeki. He is a great intellectual, visionary leader who conceptualized and gave prominence to the African Renaissance Movement. He is a sage and a walking African encyclopaedia whose insights never stop to amaze us. Any university that would have the privilege to have such a figure committing to giving his collections would certainly have cracked the Rosetta Stone code to many vistas of the African history and political heritage.
African and global scholars, students and the general public will be the primary beneficiaries of the state of the art Thabo Mbeki Presidential Library.
Indeed, today, through this significant milestone in the life of this country and UNISA, I am proud to be an African. The Africa rising narrative is neither automatic nor without risks along the way, it is the eternal vigilance through robust intellection that we must claim and shape the narrative in terms defined by Africans themselves. The Thabo Mbeki Presidential Library is one of the most potent weapons in reclaiming that space. It is fitting that the launch takes place during the heritage month and only few days after remembering Steve Biko.
Members of our distinguished audience, go tell it on the mountain that this unique Library has been introduced and launched. Go tell them that Africa, in many ways, is rising against all odds. The spirit of great African thought leaders such as Nkwame Nkrumah, Marcus Garvey, Frederick Douglas, Julius Nyerere, Cheik Ante Diop, Maya Angelou, Amilcar Cabral, WEB du Bois, Angela Davis, OR Tambo, Robert Sobukwe, Anton Lembede, Pixley Isaiah ka Seme, Archie Mafeje, Eskia Mpahlele is reverberating in these halls as we seek to emancipate the African voice.
Unisa, enviably, becomes the very first university in South Africa to launch a presidential library. Unisa is innovative, it is a trailblazer, it is a pathfinder and it seeks to engage in a dialogue with generations to come. The future beckons us as we seek to position ourselves as the centre that makes meaningful contribution to the current discourses on Africa and the African future. The launch of this library is an indicator that will ensure that the 21st Century is truly an African century.
We stand here before you to defy the African proverb which says “When an old man dies, a library burns to the ground.” Here we have come to establish a collection point for the African sages and leaders to deposit their knowledge before they meet the inevitable experience of all mortal beings. In a sense, figuratively we have crafted this basket to catch the harvested grain before it is wasted to the ground, we have come with a well-carved calabash to ensure that water is collected before spilling to the ground. Future generations will be proud heirs of the rich inheritance we are creating today. This launch marks the arrival of a Spring Season in the world of academia and the research product coming out of this library will be the blossoming flowers in the garden of African knowledge.
I thank you.
Bio
Prof Makhanya was born in Durban and started his schooling at Sinamuva Catholic School in Tongaat. He then moved to Mshwathi Memorial School where he completed his primary school education. Thereafter, he started his secondary school education at KwaMakhutha High School. Before he could complete his studies there, there were student uprisings which resulted in the suspension of all student leaders. He was one of the students suspended from school. The student leaders were reinstated, however, when they won a court case against their suspension. He then went to the University of Fort Hare, a period which was marked by numerous expulsions from the University. During those periods, he worked for a municipality.
On 1 January 2011, Prof Makhanya took up the position of Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University of South Africa. Prior to this, he held the positions of Pro-Vice-Chancellor of the University of South Africa (from 1 January 2008 to 31 December 2010), Executive Dean of the College of Human (from 2004 to 2007) and Dean of the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at the old Unisa. Before that, Prof Makhanya worked in the sales and marketing division of a multinational company until he was recruited to the lecturing staff at Unisa.
Prof Makhanya holds a BA and BA (Hons) in Sociology from the University of Fort Hare, a master's degree from the University of Natal and a DPhil from the University of Pretoria. In 2009, he completed the Advanced Management Program at the Harvard Business School. The University of Athabasca in Canada conferred an honorary doctorate on Prof Makhanya in recognition of his outstanding leadership at Unisa and his contribution as a distinguished scholar in distance education.
In addition to the above, Prof Makhanya is a Referee for the National Research Foundation (NRF): specialising in refereeing applications for funding, grants and postgraduate scholarships (Sociology, Development Studies, Business Administration and Social Work).
He is an external examiner for the University of Fort Hare, the University of North West and the University of Johannesburg. He is also a trainer for trainers of adult basic education.
As a sociologist he is invited by the media to provide an analysis of various political and sociocultural issues.
Prof Makhanya publishes widely in accredited journals. His recent publication is entitled "The importance of basic education in the mitigation of HIV/AIDS among informal sector workers".
He also addresses a number of conferences on various topics. Organisationally he is a member of the following:
- Council Member of the South African Sociological Association
- Deputy President (1998-2000) of the South African Sociological Association
- Member of the South African Sociological Association
- Member of the International Association of Sociology
Besides his academic endeavours locally, Prof Makhanya engages in academic and higher education forums in South and Southern Africa, and internationally. In this regard, mention can be made of the role that he plays in Unesco and its activities. He is the deputy chair of the South African National Commission for Unesco, as well as chair of the Culture Sector of South African National Commission for Unesco.
On a more personal note, Prof Makhanya is a committed family man who enjoys spending time with his family and friends. He loves sport and he is a fan of soccer, rugby, karate and boxing.
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