A PAPER DELIVERED BY THE DEPUTY MINISTER OF EDUCATION, MR MOSIBUDI MANGENA, AT THE ANNUAL FORMAL DINNER OF THE MEDICAL RESIDENCE OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CAPE TOWN: GRAND WEST CASINO 18 AUGUST 2001

TOPIC: African Renaissance: The Role of a Young African in Rebuilding Our Country and Continent

Director of Ceremonies,

Members of the Medical Residence of the University of Cape Town, may I thank you for inviting me to this auspicious occasion. An occasion of this nature is important in many ways insofar as nation building is concerned. Let me assure you that this is an initiative I am honoured to address.

This is because the topic you have given me, namely, African Renaissance, raises fundamental questions about the essence of being. It pricks your conscience and sets you on a moral journey to rediscover yourself in the socio-political and economic conjecture of Globalisation. Merely by putting the concept of African Renaissance on your agenda you have ignited a critical process that challenges all systems and notions that seek to undermine the African here and the world over.

Allow me therefore to pause and congratulate you.

I am in agreement with the people who say, African Renaissance is not a new concept at all. Great scholars and revolutionaries like Marcus Garvey, Nkwame Nkrumah, Cheik Anta Diop, Franz Fanon, Amilcar Cabral, Walter Rodney etc. have at different times in history contributed tremendously in the project of African Renaissance.

We know and appreciate that history gave us a son, Steve Biko, that stood out to be counted as one of those that had his name indelibly inscribed on the face of this noble project. As you know, Steve Biko's characterisation and systematisation of the existential conditions of the Black people in South Africa came to be known as the black consciousness philosophy.

It is important to acknowledge President Mbeki's effort in this regard. There is no doubt that he has done a great deal in reopening the debate on African Renaissance. And it is right that he did not exhaust the debate so that it remains open to welcome inputs that would shape and refine the product. Had he exhausted it, the debate would have been closed as soon as it had been opened.

In the South African context, where Black people have been subjected to centuries of the most horrendous levels of oppression, exploitation and racism, any African Renaissance programme must base itself on Black Consciousness. During these trying times Blacks had their history, culture, value systems and norms almost destroyed. Our humanity as a people has over a long period of time received a severe and vicious bludgeoning from a myriad of merciless colonial forces. Being a framework whose internal dynamics give form to the entire expression of active resistance against degrading systems, Black Consciousness seeks to produce a black person that see himself/herself as self-defined and self-assertive – a complete human being.

But then where do we locate the young African in the rebuilding of our country and the entire continent? I know that many people in positions of influence do not want to hear anymore talk about race, about whites and Blacks. They consider such talk divisive, negative and harping on the past. They would rather hear more talk about reconciliation and the rainbow nation. They seem to derive comfort from the fact that it sounds a bit romantic and melodious. Rather unfortunately, rebuilding of a nation is a mammoth task that cannot be built on false notions of history.

Society has a responsibility to tell our history as is. It does not matter how embarrassing or humiliating it might be.

In a talk I delivered elsewhere I characterized inequality as the deadliest enemy of our country. This inequality is a result of structuring society into ethnic enclaves of haves and have-nots. We have subjected our young people to conditions that give rise to destructive racial antagonisms created by apartheid and racism. The root of these socio-economic inequalities is to be found in the economic base of our society. All preaching about reconciliation that does not address the distribution of the wealth amounts to zero. Young Africans need to know this simple fact and initiate strategies that guarantee a fair redistribution of the fruits of our citizens’ labour. The truth of the matter is that the scaffolding used to build racial inequalities in our country was removed by the death of constitutional and legal apartheid in 1994, but the edifice itself still stands firm and strong.

This lends us in the realm of development and reconstruction. In his essay, African Culture in Education for Sustainable Development, Micere Githae Mugo cautions that:

Sustainable development as envisioned by an African Renaissance should move beyond a definition that confines “development” to such concerns as market economic advancement, availability of capital, superiority of infrastructure, automation of resources, acquisition of technological know-how… For certain these are important components of development, but in all of these spaces the one factor devoid of which progress is meaningless is missing, namely, the development of the human being.

Mugo concludes the argument by making a point that "if limited to the above, ‘development’ automatically favours the powerful and wealthy while excluding groups targeted by silencing constructions of race and gender in particular”.

This advice could not be more relevant than it is for us who are immersed in the intricacies of transition and transformation. The Black Employment Equity Act and Affirmative Action immediately spring to mind. These measures are designed to redress the historical imbalances that have condemned our people to unprecedented levels of under-development. But as they do so they tend to have unintended results. We are aware that the corporate world is recruiting students into their ranks upon completing their junior degrees. They are offered generous salaries, German cars and a host of other benefits. Ordinarily, this ought to be something good to be received as such.

Most unfortunately, this phenomenon tends to indulge our young people in a dangerous subculture of materialism. They no longer see the need to pursue their studies up to masters and doctoral levels.

In the process they are deprived of the opportunity to conduct research and specialise. The tragedy of all this is that it represents the threshold of the epistemological demise of our young people. By extension, it also implies that the nation is effectively denied intellectual and leadership reserves. If that is what it boils down to, then the future is leaderless.

This may also be a direct challenge to our education system to ensure that it does not merely come out with products that are tailored to gratify nothing more than the interests of big business. These products must be prepared such that they are critical intellectual beings.

It gives me joy that this evening you have in your programme space to celebrate African cultural diversity with various performances. As they say, diversity is our strength. It is a scientific fact that as human beings we are differentially capacitated. This makes us to be mutually depended on one another. In other words, a community is born. Thus power lies not so much in your similarity to others, but rather in your difference from them. Your difference from others is what validates your relevance and purpose in life.

The rituals we will be performing are part of our culture. Culture makes us to be who we are. Sadly, the education we receive is so alienating that the African educated elite are strangers to their own people. To start with, the education we receive is in a foreign language. As a result, we can hardly explain to our illiterate parents in the villages and townships what it is that we have learned. But the sad thing is that the educated African is so proud of their deculturalisation that they emphasise it and try hard to put a distance between themselves and the uneducated mass. The educated elite enjoys the food of those whose education they imbibed. They try hard to eat it in their manner and style.

He enjoys and appreciates the music of others, and is proud to display his taste to all and sundry. He turns his back on his own and looks down on the music and dances of his people. If we still have any authentic African music and dance, we should thank our own uneducated people. The educated lot are the worst cultural traitors you could find.

The tragedy of it all is that the educated African can aspire for European culture and mannerisms, but can never be European. He remains African in features, location and origin, making him a perpetual student and a poor imitation of the European. He spends his time in a zone of blurred images that lie somewhere between Europe and Africa. He has one foot in Europe and one in Africa, trying all the time to lift the one foot out of Africa, but failing miserably to do so.

The picture I have just drawn is that of someone without a soul and conscience. He is an empty shell, a shadow of himself. Obviously, a young African like this would not present a good spectacle that is inflated with hope.

This may perhaps be the opportunity to remind the young African that Africans of antiquity boasted the most advanced civilization of their time, while the rest of humanity, including Europeans, were still savages living in caves. They invented the calendar (in use by at least 4236 B.C.), practised astronomy and astrology. They were the first people to write, practise metallurgy, mathematics and advanced architecture that they employed to build magnificent temples and the awe-inspiring pyramids using stones. Some of their buildings were erected by their engineers and architects employing 6 million tons of stone but no cement or any adhesive material was used.

Granted the fact that Africans were the first people to develop and practise mathematics and other hard sciences, it is beyond me just how it came about that all of a sudden mathematics is now a "difficult" subject for those who developed it.

Behold, the elegant picture crafted above is no more than a reminder about the heydays of our bygone times. Your proud smile will not last long if you consider some of the facts below.

In Africa 340 million people, or half the population, live on less than US $1 per day. The mortality rate of children under 5 years of age is 140 per 1000, and life expectancy at birth is only 54 years. Only 58% of the population have access to safe water. The rate of illiteracy for people over 15 is 41%. There are only 18 mainline telephones per 1000 people in Africa, compared with 146 for the world as a whole and 567 for high-income countries.

A concerted initiative calls for the reversal of this abnormal situation by changing the relationship that underpins it. We as Africans are appealing neither for the further entrenchment of dependency through aid, nor marginal concessions.

The impoverishment of the African continent was accentuated primarily by the legacy of colonialism, the cold war, the workings of the international economic system and the inadequacies and short comings of the policies pursued by many countries in the post independence era.

For centuries, Africa has been integrated into the world economy mainly as a supplier of cheap labour and raw materials. Of necessity, this has meant the draining of Africa’s resources rather than their use for the continent’s development. The drive in that period to use the minerals and raw materials to develop manufacturing industries and a highly skilled human base to sustain growth and development was lost. Thus Africa remains the poorest continent despite being one of the most richly endowed regions of the world.

In other countries and continents the direct opposite occurred. There was an infusion of wealth in the form of investments that created larger volumes of wealth through the export of value-added products. It is about time that African resources are harnessed to expand the creation of wealth on the continent for the well being of her peoples.

In a quest for practical solutions, African leaders led by President Mbeki came up with the New African Initiative to address the problems I have outlined. The plan has been adopted at the last meeting of the Organisation of African Unity. The African initiative centres on African ownership and management. Through this programme African leaders are setting an agenda for the renewal and the revival of the continent. To achieve these objectives, African leaders will take responsibility for the following:

· To strengthen mechanisms for conflict prevention, management and resolution at the regional and continental levels, and to ensure that these mechanisms are used to restore and maintain peace.

· To promote and protect democracy and human rights in their respective countries and regions by developing clear standards of accountability, transparency and participative governance at the national and regional levels.

· To restore and maintain macro-economic stability especially by developing appropriate standards and targets for fiscal and monetary policies, and introducing appropriate institutional frameworks to achieve these standards.

· To institute transparent legal and regulatory frameworks for financial markets and auditing of private companies and the public sector.

· To revitalise and extend the provision of education, technical training and health services with high priority given to HIV/AIDS, malaria and other communicable diseases.

· To promote the role of women in social and economic development by reinforcing their capacities in the domains of education and training; by the development of revenue generating activities through facilitating access to credit; and by assuring their participation in the political and economic life of African countries.

· To build the capacity of the states in Africa to set and enforce the legal framework, as well as maintain law and order.

· To promote the development of infrastructure, agriculture and its diversification into agro-industries and manufacturing to serve both domestic and export markets

· To eradicate poverty in Africa and to place African countries both individually and collectively on a path of sustainable growth and thus halt the marginalisation of Africa in the globalisation process.

· To achieve and sustain an average gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate of above 7% per annum for the next 15 years.

The Plan points out that key problems in education in Africa are the poor facilities and inadequate systems under which the vast majority of Africans receive their training. It accordingly supports the immediate strengthening of the university system across Africa including the creation of specialised universities where needed and building on available African teaching staff. The need to enhance the presence of institutes of technology is especially emphasised.

The second significant component of education is the building of primary schools in all villages, and secondary schools in all regions. We know what a strong weapon education is in freeing the poor from the strangling tentacles of poverty. Education is the vehicle that will deliver Africa from bondage so that Africa can reclaim her rightful place among the continents of the globe. It is therefore imperative that every child in Africa must be educated to its fullest potential. African leaders must commit themselves to making this happen.

In our country, sad to say, there are still 3.5 million adults over the age of 16 who have never attended school. Some 2.5 million adults have had some schooling but were poorly taught, or lack practice. As such they have lost much of their earlier ability to read and write. That makes 6 million South Africans who are essentially barred from the written word; from the sources of information and imaginative stimulation that books hold. It is a tragic experience for our people to be deprived of the more functional everyday empowerment that written language gives.

At this juncture you should realise that the road ahead is an arduous one. It has twists and turns, ups and downs. It is not a road to be travelled by the faint-hearted. The less said about the greedy and selfish, the better. Africa needs a young African who thinks not only for himself/herself, but also for the entire community. Mother Africa is weeping, and is in deep agony soliciting your contribution. Think, decide and act.

I thank you