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Njabulo Simakahle Ndebele | |
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| Born | Johannesburg, South Africa |
| Occupation | Chancellor Writer |
| Nationality | South African |
| Website | |
| www.njabulondebele.co.za | |
Njabulo Simakahle Ndebele is an academic and writer of fiction who is the former vice-chancellor and principal of the University of Cape Town (UCT). On 16 November 2012 he was inaugurated as the chancellor of the University of Johannesburg.
As of December 2023 [update] he is the chairman of the Nelson Mandela Foundation. [1]
Ndebele's father was Nimrod Njabulo Ndebele and his mother was Makhosazana Regina Tshabangu. He married Mpho Kathleen Malebo on 30 July 1971. They have one son and two daughters. Ndebele was awarded a Bachelor of Arts in English and philosophy by the University of Botswana, Lesotho, and Swaziland in 1973; a Master of Arts in English literature by the University of Cambridge in 1975; and a Doctor of Philosophy in creative writing by the University of Denver in 1983. He also studied at Churchill College, University of Cambridge, where he was the first recipient of the South African Bursary.
Njabulo Ndebele was vice-chancellor and principal at the University of Cape Town from July 2000 to June 2008, following tenure as a scholar in residence at the Ford Foundation’s headquarters in New York. He joined the foundation in September 1998, immediately after a five-year term of office as vice-chancellor and principal of the University of the North in Sovenga, in the then Northern Province. Previously he served as vice-rector of the University of the Western Cape. Earlier positions include chair of the Department of African Literature at the University of the Witwatersrand; and pro-vice-chancellor, Dean, and head of the English department at the National University of Lesotho.
An established novelist, Ndebele published The Cry of Winnie Mandela in 2004 to critical acclaim. An earlier publication Fools and Other Stories won the Noma Award, Africa's highest literary award for the best book published in Africa in 1984. [2] His highly influential essays on South African literature and culture were published in a collection Rediscovery of the Ordinary .
Ndebele served as president of the Congress of South African Writers for many years. As a public figure he is known for his incisive insights in commentaries on a range of public issues in South Africa.
Ndebele is also a key figure in South African higher education. He has served as chair of the South African Universities Vice-Chancellors Association from 2002 to 2005, and served on the executive board of the Association of African Universities since 2001. He has done public service in South Africa in the areas of broadcasting policy, school curriculum in history, and more recently as chair of a government commission on the development and use of African languages as media of instruction in South African higher education. He served as president of the AAU from 2005 to 2009 and was chair of the Southern African Regional Universities Association. He is also a fellow of UCT.
He holds honorary doctorates from universities in the United Kingdom, Netherlands, Japan, South Africa and the United States. The University of Cambridge awarded him an honorary doctorate in law in 2006, and he was made an honorary fellow of Churchill College in 2007. In 2008 the University of Michigan awarded him another honorary doctorate in law. [3]
Njabulo Ndebele also contributed to Chimurenga magazine.
Graça Machel is a Mozambican politician and humanitarian. She is the widow of former President of Mozambique Samora Machel (1975–1986) and former President of South Africa Nelson Mandela (1998–2013). Machel is an international advocate for women's and children's rights and was made an honorary Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth II in 1997 for her humanitarian work. She is the only woman in modern history to have served as First Lady of two countries, South Africa and Mozambique.
Mamphela Aletta Ramphele is a South African politician, anti-apartheid activist, medical doctor and businesswoman. She was a partner of anti-apartheid activist Steve Biko, with whom she had two children. She is a former vice-chancellor at the University of Cape Town and a former managing director at the World Bank. Ramphele founded political party Agang South Africa in February 2013 but withdrew from politics in July 2014. Since 2018, she has been the co-president of the Club of Rome
The Noma Award for Publishing in Africa, which ran from 1980 to 2009, was an annual $10,000 prize for outstanding African writers and scholars who published in Africa. Within four years of its establishment, the prize "had become the major book award in Africa". It was one of the series of Noma Prizes.
Thomas Tlou was a Botswana academic and historian, and former representative of Botswana at the United Nations. Tlou was born in Gwanda in the then Southern Rhodesia in 1932.
Edward Neville Isdell is an Irish businessman, former chair and CEO of The Coca-Cola Company and currently president of the WWF.
Peter Rudolf Gisela Horn was a Czech-born South African poet. He made his mark especially with his anti-Apartheid poetry. At the end of World War II he had to flee from his home and settled with his parents first in Bavaria and later in Freiburg im Breisgau, where he completed high school in 1954. He then emigrated with his parents to South Africa.
Thabo Cecil Makgoba KStJ is the South African Anglican archbishop of Cape Town. He had served before as bishop of Grahamstown.
Nadia Davids is a South African playwright, novelist, and author of short stories and screenplays. Her work has been published, produced, and performed in Southern Africa, Europe, and the United States. She was a Philip Leverhulme Prize winner in 2013. Her play What Remains won five Fleur du Cap Theatre Awards.
Max Price is a former vice-chancellor and principal of the University of Cape Town (UCT) in South Africa. He succeeded Njabulo Ndebele and held this position for 10 years from 19 August 2008 until 30 June 2018.
The Chancellor of the University of Cape Town (UCT) is the ceremonial head of the university, representing it in the public sphere and conferring degrees in its name. The Chancellorship is a titular position; the chief executive of the university is the Vice-Chancellor. The current Chancellor, the sixth since UCT was elevated to university status in 1918, is Precious Moloi-Motsepe. She is succeeding Graça Machel, the wife of South African ex-President Nelson Mandela who served as chancellor from 1999 until 2019. If there are multiple nominations the Chancellor is chosen by an electoral college representing staff, students and graduates. Formerly Chancellors were appointed for life, but since 1999 they are appointed for a renewable ten-year term.
Rosina Mamokgethi Phakeng is a South African professor of mathematics education who in 2018 became a vice-chancellor of the University of Cape Town (UCT). She has been the vice principal of research and innovation, at the University of South Africa and acting executive dean of the College of Science, Engineering and Technology at UNISA. In 2018 she was an invited speaker at the International Congresses of Mathematicians. In February 2023 it was announced that she would leave her position as vice-chancellor of UCT and take early retirement. She was succeeded by Professor Daya Reddy on 13 March 2023
The Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cape Town (UCT) is the executive head also referred to as the principal. The VC has the overall responsibility for the policy and administration of the University. The current Vice-Chancellor, the tenth since UCT was elevated to university status in 1918 is Mamokgethi Phakeng.
Jan Hendrik Steyn was a South African judge, a development leader and campaigner for social justice. He was an advocate for justice and equality in The Republic of South Africa and served South Africa and several Southern African Development Community countries, in the highest capacity in the fields of law and development. In recognition of his service he was awarded honorary doctorates from five South African universities.
Mbulelo Vizikhungo Mzamane was a South African author, poet, and academic. He was described by the late President Nelson Mandela as a "visionary leader and one of South Africa’s greatest intellectuals".
Peter Vale is a senior research fellow at the Centre for the Advancement of Scholarship at the University of Pretoria, South Africa, and the Nelson Mandela Professor of Politics Emeritus at Rhodes University, South Africa. He is also an honorary professor at the Africa Earth Observatory Network (AEON) of which he was a founding member. Notably, Vale was the founding director of the Johannesburg Institute for Advanced Study (JIAS) and acting vice-rector for academic affairs and deputy vice-chancellor of the University of the Western Cape, South Africa. He has also received an honoury doctorate in the Humanities from the University of the Free State, South Africa.
Ravan Press, established in 1972 by Peter Ralph Randall, Danie van Zyl, and Beyers Naudé, was a South African anti-apartheid publishing house.
Sisonke Msimang is a South African writer, activist and political analyst based in Perth, Western Australia, whose focus is on race, gender, and politics. She is known for her memoir Always Another Country: A memoir of exile and home (2017) and The Resurrection of Winnie Mandela (2018), a biography of anti-apartheid activist Winnie Madikizela-Mandela.
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