/ 18 June 2010

Mbeki’s institute stalls

Mbeki's Institute Stalls

The Thabo Mbeki Leadership Institute is struggling to source funding and has had to postpone the launch of some courses because of a shortage of money.

The brainchild of the former president, it is seen as a way for Mbeki to leave a legacy that is not tainted by his unseating as ANC president and national leader.

Professor Shadrack Gutto, director of Unisa’s Centre for African Renaissance Studies, which houses the institute, said that courses due to start in July have been postponed until the institute comes up with the money to fund them.

To get the organisation off the ground, Unisa provided office space and it pays the salaries of a manager and two support staff. Gutto said he had not quantified the amount invested in the initiative.

“There is now a very aggressive funding process which must provide the money for the courses to take place. One hopes that the institute will need our support for only a year or so, but we don’t have a timeline,” Gutto told the Mail & Guardian. Gutto is the institute’s curriculum manager and its link to Unisa.

The funding committee of the Thabo Mbeki Foundation, which is responsible for the initiative, is chaired by Wiseman Nkuhlu, a former head of Nepad and later a leading light in the Congress of the People (Cope) in the Eastern Cape.

The launch of the institute is scheduled for October, when a conference on intellectual dialogue about leadership will take place at Unisa.

Inaugural lecture
The institute aims to attract professionals from all fields, who will be funded to do degrees or courses in leadership, especially in an African context. Unisa hopes this will help raise its profile.

Gutto said the institute plans to draw in students for master’s and doctoral degrees, but this would depend on how much funding was raised.

“Students will include political, academic and business leaders,” he said.

The difference between this and similar institutions, he said, is that students of the institute will be fully funded and will be helped with placements in organisations such as the Southern African Development Community and the African Union.

Currently there are no estimates of how many students the institute will house.

“It is very difficult to know how many students there will be before we know what funding we can get.”

Institute courses will be accredited by Unisa and students may take them as part of their studies towards degrees.

Mbeki gave the institute’s inaugural lecture in May at Unisa in Pretoria. The launch was attended by 1 000 people, including several members of his former Cabinet. They included former deputy president Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, former ministers Essop Pahad, Alec Erwin and Thoko Didiza, former deputy minister Aziz Pahad, Mbeki’s former director general, Frank Chikane, and former Haitian president Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

Gauteng Cope leader Lyndall Shope-Mafole was a VIP guest, while other Cope supporters were also present.