By: Lindiwe Sisulu
Thank you for the honour to be invited to deliver the Govan Mbeki Memorial Lecture at this temple of higher education through whose hallowed corridors have walked some of Africa’s leaders who championed the liberation struggle from colonialism, among them Kenneth Kaunda, Seretse Khama, Yusuf Lule, Julius Nyerere, Robert Mugabe and Joshua Nkomo to mention a few.
The University of Fort Hare’s history will forever hold a special place in our liberation from Apartheid era. Alumni like Robert Sobukwe, Nelson Mandela, Oliver Tambo, Chris Hani, Mangosuthu Buthelezi and Desmond Tutu, among others, will be forever etched into history of this unique institution. The name of Govan Mbeki, like his peers, is also engraved in the memory of this pantheon of African education. It is the memory of his life and his sacrifice to the liberation of our country that brings us together here, today.
In 1878 when James Stewart, a missionary with the Lovedale Missionary Institute, suggested that an institution for the higher education of Black African students needed to be created, it took almost 40 years for the idea to come to see the light of day in 1916 under its first principal, Alexander Kerr. It was certainly not in the plan, nor their wildest imagination, that this University over 100 years later, remains a leading institution of learning in our country and in Africa at large. Throughout these years Fort Hare gave up its sons and daughters to serve the mother Continent wherever duty calls, and lest we forget, its history will show that the first Black staff member, Davidson Don Tengo Jabavu, lectured in Latin and African languages.
Today, this University still beckons to the young of the land. This University now nurtures a new generation of young people, or in Xhosa young “calves”, who will lead our country to higher ground and further away from the legacies of disenfranchisement, division cultivated by colonialism and its offspring, Apartheid. Destroying colonialism and apartheid was Govan Mbeki’s life mission and indeed the mission was achieved in his lifetime.
Oom Gov left this great institution in 1936 as a writer, intellectual and political activist to became a core leader of the African National Congress, the Communist Party, and MK the Military wing of the ANC. He was sentenced to life imprisonment along with my father, Nelson Mandela, Raymond Mhlaba – for whom this sub-region is befittingly named. Even in Robben Island Prison, Oom Govan wrote profusely as tension developed between himself and other leaders in prison over the future of the national liberation movement. He was not labelled as a hardliner for no reason. He believed his way was the best way and remained unbending till death. Unlike some of us today, he believed in the purity of the struggle and saw compromise as weakness. Today he holds a unique position in South African political history, memory, and paradigm. We can only succeed if we are inspired and guided, by the life and example of Oom Gov, as Govan Mbeki was affectionately and respectfully called.
Martin Luther King, Jr. once said: “The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character – that is the goal of true education”. Education is about the change of self and society; it is transformational in character and worldview.
The 1960 United Nations General Assembly Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples, demonstrated an international anti-colonial consensus. The declaration asserted the “necessity of bringing to a speedy and unconditional end to colonialism in all its forms and manifestations” and proclaimed that “the subjection of peoples to alien subjugation, domination, and exploitation constitutes a denial of fundamental human rights, and is contrary to the Charter of the United Nations and is an impediment to the promotion of world peace and co-operation”.
Where are we today, over 60 years later? In a seminal paper; “Decolonising education in Africa: implementing the right to education by re-appropriating culture and indigeneity” – Foluke Ifejola Adebisi posits:
“The colonial experience reduced education to a tool of communication between the colonizer and the colonized. Emphasis on the individual and de-emphasis on community and culture resulted in ideological dissonance. Despite post-independence attempts to reverse this, vestiges of post-coloniality in contemporary education remain and perpetuate a myth of inferiority of indigenous knowledge and methods. This deprives the world of a wider range of ways of knowing, pedagogy, and epistemologies”.
We have come a long way. But I argue that there is a long way to go yet for African learners and scholars. The creativity of the African child must be unleashed in schools to focus on creating stuff, making stuff, selling stuff, and solving stuff. The theme of my talk today – “Re-imagining South Africa’s Education System for the 21st Century and Beyond” – is offered through the prism of Oom Gov.
Let’s remind ourselves who Oom Gov was and the legacy he left us. Oom Gov worked as a teacher but lost his job because of his political activities, and in 1952 he was imprisoned, together with Raymond Mhlaba and Vuyisile Mini, for three months in Rooi Hel Prison in Port Elizabeth) for participating in the “Campaign of Defiance against Injustice Laws”. He later joined the editorial board of New Age, a prominent leftist newspaper linked to underground CPSA/ SACP networks and played a crucial role in ensuring that the pages and columns reflected the conditions, demands, and aspirations of black working-class people, particularly in the rural areas.
In 1960, the ANC was banned, and went on to form Umkhonto we Sizwe (MK) along with the underground SACP. In November 1962, the then-Minister of Justice, John Vorster, banned New Age. Not to be deterred, the editorial board came out with its successor publication, Spark. Vorster went one step further by banning, not the newspaper but its editors and writers. This effectively ended Mbeki’s role as editor and journalist in the country. On 11 July 1963, he was arrested with other MK high commanders and 1964, during the Rivonia Trial was sentenced to Robben Island where he served 24 years. In prison Oom Gov managed to run education classes with prisoners and wrote several significant analyses which were kept on the island and used for discussions. Surviving copies were published in 2015 as “Learning from Robben Island: The Prison Writings of Govan Mbeki”.
In 1992 Oom Gov published “The Struggle for Liberation in South Africa: A Short History” and in 1996, “Sunset at Midday: Latshonilangemini!”. His sons, Thabo and Moeletsi, have continued in their father’s footsteps, publishing thoughtful treatise and stirring debate.
The big debate, likely to stir dissent and controversy, as it should, lies in the challenge of how we re-imagine our education system devoid of colonial limitations. Does this begin with re-shaping curriculum to re-designing course delivery methods, all the way to re-modelling student support services?
Trends and technology innovation cycles are turning over faster, and the new generation expects everyone to keep up – after all, those who fit into the Gen Z camp, have never known it to be any different. For them, “always on” and always digital is the only norm. Within this, imaginary, traditional college degrees might as well dissolve into thin air. As all innovations push our social machine forward, what bears the most significance will hardly be credentials incapable of bespeaking one’s unique competencies.
It was in December 2019 that COVID-19 was first reported. We didn’t know then the full extent of its impact on our lives, and the lives of billions of people around the globe. Not to mention on education. The response to the pandemic was to shut down face-to-face primary and tertiary education for almost half of the world’s student population. The events of 2020, driven predominantly by the COVID-19 pandemic, have forced governments, policymakers, educators, and organizations to rethink the purpose, structure, and modality of existing education systems. Is COVID-19 as an opportunity for educational innovation?
to ensure learning continues with minimal disruption but also empowers students as compassionate human beings, prepared for an unpredictable future, but also as global citizens seeking a peaceful and kinder world. The purpose of education needs to change from being instrumental (based on human capital) to one that is constitutive (human- flourishing), accessible to all, and structured such that learning can happen anytime and anywhere, and always.
Strong problem solvers and flexible thinkers are needed to create a kinder, more peaceful world are what I imagine for the 21st century. Many education approaches continue to focus mainly on rote memorization, aiming to build the intellectual capacities of learners and attempting to make them job-ready – recognizing high academic calibre with grades based on performance in standardized assessments.
The problem here is that continuing to focus education on the goal of increasing human capital isn’t necessarily sustainable. Further, traditional grading, which is based on assumptions about humans based on the law of averages as expressed in a bell curve, necessarily creates winners and losers. As Yong Zhao puts it, there is a “manufactured scarcity” of educational achievement possibilities. Such a model sets up a large portion of students for failure from the outset. The traditional model is not just outdated from the standpoint of the paradigm from which it emerged; it is inherently unjust.
But there is a much more fundamental problem with traditional schooling. It is not yet moving with the times. It was not designed to meet basic human needs, and the evidence is increasingly clear that many students face serious forms of neglect, mistreatment, and indeed outright.
As an African country, our education must be African-centred. This is also what I imagine. An African-centred education is defined as education designed to empower African people. A central premise is that many Africans have been subjugated by limiting their awareness of themselves and indoctrinating them with ideas that work against them.
In a 1992 article, US anthropologist Linus A. Hoskins wrote: “There is a vital necessity for African people to use the weapons of education and history to extricate themselves from this psychological dependency complex/syndrome as a necessary precondition for liberation. If African peoples (the global majority) were to become African-centred, that would spell the ineluctable end of the global powers that have dominated them. This is indeed the fear of the colonial powers. African-centeredness is a state of mind, a particular subconscious mindset that is rooted in the African ancestral heritage and value system.” This is a similar view I also hold about the judiciary, especially its Africanization, including the Africanization of the financial sector and our land, or shall I say stolen land.
Global educational experts are adamant that education as we know it is changing. No longer does a formal educational system adequately serve global needs. The game has changed to foster creativity and innovation. The game has changed to finding imaginative solutions. Panel experts at educational summits and leading entrepreneurs have pointed to the significance of a little bit of craziness, adaptation, problem-solving, innovation, teamwork, and disruption. After all, with great innovation, Apple and Google disrupted the way we communicate and the way we seek knowledge. The Internet and email disrupted postal services. Social media has disrupted traditional media and communication.
Today, recent tech companies now are far wealthier than giant oil companies, mining companies, and various established industries that have been around for 100 years. We live in the digital age. We live in the fourth/ fifth industrial revolution.
Developing countries in The Middle East are moving at a rapid pace to convert their finite natural resources (oil), to empower their human resources. Within their own cultural context, the Gulf countries like the UAE, Bahrain, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia are making great strides in the field of education and have become globally competitive in business. Their airlines, shopping destinations, and investments have gone global, all built on their cultural foundations, historical foundation, and language. Their schools and universities are affiliated with global best practices but have deep roots in their confidence-boosting culture and self-determination. Realizing the game-changing power of technology they have invested in large innovation centres for the development and application of Artificial Intelligence (AI). UAE even has a minister of Artificial intelligence.
There is a need for a Pan African and National Innovation System that holistically meshes and fosters education, ideas, funding, and marketing, within a historical context. In the area of finance and the trust protocol, blockchain and its accompanying cryptocurrencies are transforming the way we do business. South Africa needs re-positioning if we are to remain competitive.
EDUCATION: HOW WILL SOUTH AFRICA WIN THE FUTURE
It has often been said that if you think education is expensive, try ignorance, and as Madiba famously postulated: “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”
The failure to properly address the educational and skills deficit of a marginalised majority of the population post-apartheid has been very costly. The bulk of unemployed youth and social grantees inevitably fall within the poorly educated class. But what do we mean by education? Is it showing up in school and passing exams? It goes far beyond that. Holistically, it encompassed the acquisition of knowledge, skills, motivation, confidence, and the development of a mindset that enables an individual and the nation to win the future. At the forefront is economic empowerment, translated into the ability to earn a living, support families, and grow generational wealth. It is not only about jobs and survival, but largely about value creation, asset building and growth. The ability to grow businesses become essential. As someone put it-busy-ness. After all, if there are employees, who are the employers? Ownership is key to success.
The function of government in education is to enable and empowezr its citizens. The wealth of nations is a computation of the value creation and productivity of the citizenry. From this, government derives taxes to further empower its citizens. It is symbiotic. However, if one third of its citizens, as in South Africa (18 million people), rely on social grants to merely stay alive, then there is something seriously wrong with the country.
When we talk about education, it should not be education for education-sake, as illustrated by the anecdote of a highly educated gentleman at the pub, who over an argument, bragged “Look here, I know what I am talking about. I have a masters in biochemistry”. To which someone responded “you have a masters in biochemistry. Can you make bee:’ The takeaway here is: the application of knowledge is essential.
HISTORY AND THE GLOBAL PARADIGM
Global educational experts are adamant that education as we know it is changing. No longer does a formal educational system adequately serve global needs. The game has changed to fostering creating and innovation. The game has changed to finding imaginative solutions. Panel experts at educational summits and leading entrepreneurs have pointed to the significance of a little bit of craziness, adaptation, problem-solving, innovation, teamwork, and disruption. After all, with great innovation, Apple and Google disrupted the way we communicate and the way we seek knowledge. The internet and email disrupted postal services. Social media has disrupted traditional media and communication. And recent tech companies now are far wealthier than giant oil companies, mining companies and various established industries that have been around for 100 years. We live in the digital age. We live in the fourth/fifth industrial revolution.
So where is South Africa going in the field of education: What kind of education? What kind of education is most suited to serve developmental needs of the country and the same time make it globally competitive? How is South Africa going to harness its vast human and natural resources in the direction needed. It goes beyond schooling and innovation.
More than 50 years ago, the pan icon Kwame Nkrumah noted the need to equip student with an understanding of the contemporary world within the framework of African Civilisations, history, institutions and ideas. African studies as a subject was compulsory at the universities he built in Ghana.
Notably (accordingly to Guiness World Record), the first recognised and continuing university in the world was African, Al Karaouine University, in Fez, Morocco (859 AD), founded by an African woman. It was a full 229 years before the first European University was built at Bologna, in Italy (1088 AD). Before the disruption of slavery, colonialism, oppression, and destructive practives from the 15th Century history tells us of the great African medieval civilisations and the role higher institutions of learning played in African academic and cultural life. There is no doubt that in the 14th century, centres of learning of learning such Walata, Djenna, and Timbuktu to study. A popular saying was “All roads to wisdom leads to Timbuktu. “Mali became one of the largest and wealthiest empires in the world with the richest man who ever lived. Emperor Mansa Musa.
It was not only Mali. There were, amongst others, the Songhai empire, Kanem Borne Empire, Kuba civilization of the Congo, Ghana Empire, Munhumutapa Empire of Southern Africa, Nubia, Kush, Swahili Confederation, Ancient Kemet (Egypt), and the Ooors of North Africa who ruled and greatly civilized Southern Europe for 800 years (711 AD – 1492). They build 17 Universities in Spain. It then goes without saying that if your worldview and mindset is limited, distorted or constricted, so will your prospects of success in an increasingly competitive world. As the sages of ancient Kemet (Egypt) noted “Who you are is limited only by who you think you are”.
THE DECOLONISATION PROJECT
All over the continent, governments have either settled with the legacy of colonial education or tinkered with reform. But when young university students march the streets decolonisation of education, they seem to know something that our education policy makers are oblivious to: the poverty of the curriculum. Let’s get this clear; South Africa is an African country. Consequently, like the illustrious African empires of old, it must strive for African excellence that is at par or superior to the rest of the world. It should begin with rebuilding the confidence undermined by colonialism. After all confidence is half the battle won. This is where a robust, unapologetic, decolonisation project becomes essential, it begins with the study of history, because if you don’t know who you are, and where you have been, you will not know where you are going. It becomes limiting.
This is how Uganda tackled the decolonization issues at the level of basic education:
In colonial times African pupils and students learnt that explorers Mungo Park (Scottish) and John Speke (English) discovered River Niger and the source of the River Nile respectively, despite the fact that the people who lived around these rivers already knew of their existence and has names for them. Something was not true, was not real knowledge until it came off English lips, eyes and ears. And what came off the colonial office was meant to justify and reinforce colonialism, indoctrination, and exploitation. This, through education, Africans were fed an inferiority complex.”
Several steps to decolonise the education curriculum was undertaken thus:
“Learners in (classes) Primary One of Three learn about their immediate environment, through the oral strand. They learnt about the family, the home, school, neighbourhood, and sub-country. This was called the thematic curriculum, and they studies in their local languages, with English studied as a subject. It is at Primary Four that the learners transited to studying in English. Under Social Studies, learners were taught about its locations, physical features, vegetation, people, leaders, and how to meet people’s need in the district. In Primary Five, they looked at Uganda, Primary Six, East Africa, and in Primary Seven, Africa. There is no doubt that the curriculum was very contextual up to this level. The textbooks in use were almost all locally produced. The textbook industry in the country boomed because materials produced from outside could not be used to teach the new curriculum. Thus, where John Speke would have been praised as the one who discovered the River Nile, the Primary Five textbook says that the river was called Kiira by the Basoga, who live around it, and John Speke was the first European to see it.
THE SPEED OF TECHNOLOGY
Developing countries in the Middle East are moving at a rapid pace to convert their finite natural resources (oil), to empower their human resources. Within their own cultural context, the Gulf countries like the UAE, Bahrain, Qatar and Saudi Arabia are making great strides in the field of education and have become globally competitive in business. For example, their airlines, shopping destinations and investments have gone global, all built on their cultural foundations, historical foundation, and language. Their schools and universities are affiliated to global best practice but have deep roots in their confidence-boosting culture and self-determination. Realising the game changing power of technology they have invested in large innovation centres for the development and application of AI. UAE even has a minister of Artificial Intelligence.
The reasons for the tectonic shift to innovation and creativity are not far-fetched. After all, while resources can yield so much that if finite, knowledge, creativity and innovative ideas are infinite. There is a need for a Pan African and National Innovation System that holistically meshes and fosters education, ideas, funding, and marketing, within a historical context. In the area of finance and the trust protocol, blockchain and its accompanying cryptocurrencies will transform the way we do business. We should be positioning.
AFRICAN-CENTERED EDUCATION
As an African country, our education must be African centred. An African-centred education is defined as education designed to empower African people. A central premise is that many Africans have been subjugated by limiting their awareness of themselves and indoctrinating them with ideas that work against them. In a 1992 article, US anthropologist Linus A. Hoskins wrote: “There is a vital necessity for African people to use the weapons of education and history to extricate themselves from this psychological dependence complex/syndrome as a necessary precondition for liberation…if African peoples (the global majority were to become African-centred, that would spell the ineluctable end of the global powers that have dominated them. This is indeed the fear of those powers. African-centred is a state of mind, a particular subconscious mindset that is rooted in the African ancestral heritage and value system.
Beyond this, the creativity of the South African child must be unleashed in schools to focus on creating stuff, making stuff, selling stuff, and solving problems, cctting edge technology and its local development must be at the forefront. And if you have good stuff, you sell it to the whole world.
South African policy makers should rethink education, ensuring that it is firstly African-centred, and in the best interest of the country. It is vital to our future. They must resist influences and pressures designed to entrench a status quo, that relegates Africans to the underclass in a vicious pecking order. Anything short of an overhaul of the education system will be slow suicide. Twenty-seven years after political liberation has ample illustrations of where we lost our way.
We have incredible wealth but export it for processing! I was thrilled to hear that Ghana had come to the realisation that producing cocoa and exporting it and buying chocolate at an exorbitant price had made them re-think their methods of production. They would keep their cocoa and sell their chocolates.
I did not come to lecture esteemed academics, but to offer ideas to stimulate thought, discussion, and, in the final analysis, action. Much in the same way Oom Gov did through in his classrooms, his newspaper articles and educational notes on Robben Island contributed to the liberation of our land and our people. Let us continue with the legacy he left us to liberate the classroom, the lecture room, the laboratory, and the mind. This will help us to re-imagine our education system, re-imagine our future. May you join me in imagining a future wealth for all is a possibility, where free education for all is a right, where free health care is a norm, where we all are equal before the law, and we are true beneficiaries of our commonwealth.
Let’s imagine a future where selfless leaders serve and rule our land and harmony and prosperity reign. Let’s join hands and march onto the promised land Oom Gov, Madiba, Oom Ray, Uncle Kathy, Andrew Mlangeni, Motsoaledi, and Dennis Goldberg and Mama Winnie, and many others dreamt of.
I thank you
*This is a full version of the “Govan Mbeki Memorial Lecture” delivered by Tourism Minister and ANC NEC member Lindiwe Sisulu at Fort Hare University on Wednesday 24 August 2022
