Andy Duffy
WITS University is to restart the long and arduous search for a vice-chancellor, following the eleventh hour rejection by its chosen candidate, Sam Nolutshungu.
The university’s council met on Thursday to discuss options to fill the gap Nolutshungu left, but campus sources insist there really is only one: to advertise for new applicants, and pray the new list of hopefuls differs from its original. Ahead of Thursday’s meeting, council chairman Judge Fikile Bam, agreed: “I think that’s the way it should go.”
University of the Western Cape vice-rector Colin Bundy is being touted as a possible contender among some academics. Closely associated with Western Capes’ transformation, Bundy is widely respected as an academic and administrator. The theory is that he would be able to straddle Wits’s political divide — a quality Wits’s selection committee decided Nolutshungu had when it gave him the job.
Bundy was unavailable and Bam was unable to comment. He said, however, that the recruitment process would be a mix of advertising and head-hunting, where identified candidates would be “encouraged” to apply.
The university’s other obvious options look unlikely.
The first would be to ask current vice- chancellor Robert Charlton to stay on. Charlton ruled this out on Wednesday. The second would be to choose one of the candidates Nolutshungu beat – former vice- principal and deputy vice-chancellor June Sinclair, or University of the North vice- chancellor Njabulo Ndebele.
Both have already been sounded out by their allies. Ndebele has indicated he is not interested; Sinclair could be. Eager as ever not to show her hand, Sinclair says she will consider what comes along – “I’m qualified,” she adds.
The problem would be one of legitimacy. The selection committee rejected Sinclair and Ndebele as strongly as it chose Nolutshungu. The transformation team, which will debate the council’s decision on Tuesday, says the selection process – agreed after months of dispute –is only supposed to produce a winner, not a second and third choice. “I’d think it would take a lot of persuading for us to agree (to Sinclair),” transformation task team co- chair Shadrack Gutto says, mentioning “crisis” in the same breath.
Meanwhile, the official Wits line is that there is no cause for concern. There are still eleven months before Charlton goes, which should be ample time for the university to find a successor. Charlton dismisses as “absolute rubbish” suggestions that Nolutshungu’s decision has left the university in trouble.
But the issue has still raised concerns within government. “We are worried,” Education Department chief director for higher education Professor Itumeleng Mofala says. “There should be leadership all the time. It shouldn’t be argued over for so long.”
Charlton was also going to push council to be allowed to appoint three new permanent deputy vice-chancellors – a process which originally was to have involved Nolutshungu but now urgent if the administration is to stay on track.
Gutto adds, however, that the transformation team is likely to have a problem with Charlton’s proposal.