The turmoil at Wits over vice-chancellor Norma Reid Birley has been devastating to the university and the nation — particularly against the background of Professor Malegapuru Makgoba’s experience as deputy vice-chancellor. Of course, Wits will bounce back to continue advancing knowledge and civilisation nationally and internationally.
But a number of things obviously went wrong in Reid Birley’s appointment. The letters of reference submitted in support of her application were not flawless, in that they appear to have focused on the positive aspects of her personality and ignored the negative. The latter must have been known to the referees, since her behaviour during her leadership of Wits shows a pattern, and could not have suddenly emerged.
Secondly, it is strange that the selection committee lacked the insight to detect that the candidate they were about to appoint would be a disaster for the university.
Apparently they were mesmerised by her charisma and fine speeches, forgetting that it takes more than this to be an effective and efficient vice-chancellor. — Professor Tuntufye S Mwamwenda, University of Natal
The Mail & Guardian cartoon about the Reid Birley affair (November 29) should have shown the number of knives in her back and the perhaps fatal knife in the body of Wits University itself. We have now witnessed a major step in the transformation of Wits from an independent university, which for 40 years fought the Afrikaner Nationalist government’s political interference, to a government department that accepts tamely every diktat of the new African Nationalists.
The trail of pressure is clear: President Thabo Mbeki says the university is “unfriendly to blacks”, an unsupported statement that ignores the extensive academic support for black students and the fact that the student body is 80% black. Only weeks later, the vice-chancellor is ousted, not by the academic body, the Senate (which was told about it the following week) but by the Council, a body appointed by the government and outsiders. Instead of a clear statement of the charges against Reid Birley, we get a series of hints and rumours.
Apparently the administration found Reid Birley hard to get on with. I am not surprised. It seems that one event was a row about the non-payment of bursaries to indigent students. Coming from another country, she had not come to terms with our culture, where government servants put their own cosy lives ahead of any concerns about those they serve.
Like many members of the Wits community I am waiting with interest to see whether the next vice-chancellor is an academic of merit, or a mere African National Congress functionary. –R Wortley, PhD (Witwatersrand)
Follow Mugabe’s lead on land
I am an African-American journalist and author who has long supported the indigenous people of Southern Africa in their struggle for freedom from white domination and to restore the economic ownership of their land from European colonial invaders of the past 500 years.
Your article on the Lohatla land invasion (“Landless movement threatens invasions”, November 29) gave me hope that black South Africans are finally waking up to the urgent need to retake the lands seized from their ancestors by European settlers.
When I read press reports that white South Africans and white foreigners still own more than 90% of South Africa’s gold, diamond and other mines; that whites still own more than 70% of the arable farmland; and that the white population of South Africa, less than 25% of the total, owns most of the wealth, I am enraged.
I am urging my fellow Americans to support the rapid transfer of wealth and land to create proportional racial ownership in South Africa, so that the majority of owners are black South Africans.
Zimbabwe may have acted tactlessly when the present government ordered the transfer of most white-owned farms there to black owners. But this was historically justified, as the whites seized the lands illegally over a century ago when the British imposed colonial rule and created the white supremacist state of Rhodesia.
Now is the time for South Africa to boldly complete the aims of the liberation movement, just as President Robert Mugabe is attempting to do in Zimbabwe. Ignore the warnings that transfer of wealth and land will bring hardships to blacks. What life could be more harsh for black South Africans without wealth or land?
We, your kith and kin in the Americas, will support you. — Carl Senna, Author of Colin Powell: A Man of War and Peace and The Black Press
The central myth surrounding Africa is the denial that we are a historical people, and the claim that it entered history only as a result of European contact.
All the glory of Egypt belongs to Africa and her people, while the monuments of Ethiopia surpass them in architectural beauty. It is incumbent upon African scholars and academics to research documents and write our own history — if not, someone else will.
There is a tale of child who was told stories of struggles between a man and a lion. No matter how fearlessly and ferociously the lion fought, the man each time emerged the victor. The puzzled boy asked his father: why does the man always beat the lion, when everybody knows the lion is the strongest animal in all the jungle? The father answered: Son, the stories will always end thus until the lion learns how to write. –Terence Mashatola, Zwavelpoort
A licence to kill commuters?
The Durban metropolitan police and the South African Police Service (SAPS) owe Durbanites an explanation for the minibus taxi anarchy in the city last week. I believe they recorded all offenders, including people who displayed and brandished firearms, set up road blockades, intimidated and assaulted people on buses and obstructed other vehicles and motorists.
I fail to understand how a permit to demonstrate was granted to hooligans who were demanding the right to kill commuters and other road users. They were shouting and demanding that the KwaZulu-Natal Minister of Transport, S’bu Ndebele, should stop Operation Shanela, which is intended to remove from our roads taxi drivers without drivers’ licences or public/ professional drivers’ permits, and taxis without roadworthy certificates and operating route permits.
We are also informed that the Road Accident Fund does not pay commuters who are killed or injured in minibus taxis that do not meet the stipulated requirements.
Monday’s action was to demand a right to kill innocent people on our roads, to drive moving coffins and to increase paupers’ burials.
If our authorities allow such actions, why not let drug lords and addicts take to the streets to demand the legalisation of drugs, or cash-in-transit robbers to demand the legalisation of automatic rifles?
We deserve immediate information on what action has been taken by the metro police and SAPS against these perpetrators of violence and anarchy.
We stand by Ndebele and Operation Shanela. We are eagerly waiting for Operation Shanela to take effect in our beloved Durban/eThekwini. — Siboniso Mtolo, Inanda
Death penalty is a powerful deterrent
In your editorial of November 29 (“Speak out against evils”) you plead that moderate religious voices should rise up and condemn extremist violence.
However, violence is not just happening out there in the world beyond South Africa. Right here we have serious violence that must be curbed before it destroys the basic right of our citizens to safety.
Reading only your centre pages last week, we find that a 25-year-old woman was “lucky” to have been raped the way she was; that a young, possibly white, couple decided to hijack a car and shoot the driver; and that a British woman was held up for 14 hours and then raped while touring Mpumalanga.
Isn’t it time to concentrate on violence in this country and what can be done about it? Isn’t this where we need the combined voices of moderates of all religions and all those who are dedicated to the ideals of our young but threatened democracy?
We need a serious review of our police and justice systems, and a reconsideration of the penalties for mindless crimes of a particularly violent nature. We clearly have not reached the optimum levels of crime prevention and detection. Nor, judging by what we learned from Grootvlei, are conditions in prisons remotely satisfactory for any real rehabilitation of criminals to take place.
The series of mindless crimes leads me to question whether we as a country are really emotionally mature and sufficiently respectful of the law to have done away with the death penalty.
South Africa should not close its eyes to the example of countries such as Japan, where the death sentence is there to act as a powerful deterrent, but is extremely rarely used. — Professor Lionel H Opie, Cape Heart Centre, University of Cape Town Medical School
Plagued by nightmarish beasts
I had a dream of South Africa. In the distance, dark clouds hung over the looming Mountains of Aids, while moving ponderously towards them across the veld was a great herd of African National Buffalo, who trampled on the lesser animals in their path and left them struggling in their wake.
Around the edges, the leaders snorted menacingly at any of their number who showed resistance. Those in the middle of the herd moved slowly forward, their eyes focused only on the rich grazing available to them.
When I looked more closely at the great bovines, I could see, clinging to the hide around their orifices, a small number of New National Peckers snatching a tick here, a flea there, but which were otherwise ignored by the great beasts.
Soaring high above this multitude, cruising comfortably in the clouds and trailed by a nervous group of lesser birds, his eyes on the distant horizons, was the Eagle — “He who would be Leader of all Africa” — his distant cries barely heard by those below.
The scene disturbed me, and I awoke determined to consult a sangoma. What could this all portend? — Euan Nicholl, agitated in Amanzimtoti
Disparaging remarks
I take issue with Robert Kirby over his thoughtless denigration of animals acquired from the SPCA (Loose Canon, November 15).
I am the happy owner of two wonderful dogs, a border collie and a German shepherd, which I chose on different occasions “from those pathetic cringers on the canine death row, the sorry mutts no one else will pick because once you show pity and take them home, you find when they’re not yawling and scratching and shitting on the lounge carpet, they’re trying to impregnate your leg”.
Both my dogs were traumatised, very likely as a result of mistreatment and neglect. Both needed quiet reassurance to regain a sense of trust and equanimity. Both responded and have proved as trainable as any dog with a snobbish pedigree. Both recognised, and showed unbounded appreciation for, a good home. Today they are my shadow and my other shadow, and would defend me to the death.
Kirby’s insensitivity to the plight of abused, forsaken, forlorn and frightened animals is matched only by his predilection for vulgar language.
He is guilty of prejudicing the chances of other hapless canines finding a new home by his disparaging remarks. –Dr RJ Poynton, Auckland Park
I do not agree with M le Roux’s comments on Robert Kirby (Letters, November 22). Surely the reason for her spiteful outburst is that the truth hurts. I wish there were more columnists with Kirby’s talent for analysis and insight, and ability to put pen to paper with such success.
Mr Kirby, you are still the number one reason I buy the Mail & Guardian every week.–Doreen Kruegel, Johannesburg
In brief
The number of people who can drive a horse and carriage is dwindling. Is that a problem? Probably for Peter Austin (“Silence falls”, November 22). The truth, of course, is that it isn’t, because in the past 150 years most people have discovered more efficient means of transport. And that’s why we will, and should, stop speaking languages that have stopped providing us the service of proper communication. Endangered languages should be no cause for concern, and their extinction should be encouraged for the greater good of unity between nations. — Rob de Neef
African children’s faces have been paraded in the media in the name of giving a face to Aids. I agree the disease must be given a face — but it should be human, not African. We should encourage people to voluntarily disclose their HIV status, but should also inculcate in them a culture of knowing their fundamental right not to disclose. Parading African children in the media adds to the stigma already suffered by those infected and affected by HIV/Aids. — Phumzile Simelela, Langa, Howick
Last year I was led to believe that the decline in the rand was due to a combination of President Thabo Mbeki’s statements on HIV/Aids and President Robert Mugabe’s land policies. I am pleased, but perplexed, at the recent strengthening of the rand. Could some of the fundis who gave these reasons last year please explain what has changed? Is the rand’s performance linked to that of the Springboks? In a reverse kind of way? — Bev Gillespie
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