Nzimande and Zuma statements on Universities threaten academic freedom

07 September 2014

Today, I will submit parliamentary questions to both President Jacob Zuma and to the Minister of Higher Education and Training, Blade Nzimande, requesting they clarify several extremely disturbing statements made late last week apparently attacking academic and institutional freedom at Universities.

This comes after President Zuma advocated in a speech, given last Thursday, that the country needs "patriotic universities", a term with deeply sinister undertones, while Minister Nzimande is reported to have said that "institutional autonomy is not inherently progressive", adding that the country needed 'the infusion' of the 'transformation agenda' into university curricula (see BDLive report).

Both statements were made at a conference of the Progressive Professionals Forum in what appears to have been a full-blown session spent gratuitously attacking our hard-pressed universities.

I will also be asking President Zuma to clarify his odd interpretation of academic freedom to mean 'freedom from the ideological stranglehold of any one class'. 

Both institutional autonomy and academic freedom are protected by our Constitution. Do these statements mean that yet another part of our Constitution is no longer to the satisfaction of our fickle and grasping rulers?

Under the leadership of President Zuma and Minister Nzimande, a tone of growing resentment of one of the most precious resources in our country - our best universities - appears to have become firmly embedded in ANC discourse. 

Instead of concerning themselves with the real issues at hand - how to fund these universities as effectively as possible, how to ensure that they reach greater heights, and how to reward them for the outstanding work they do with limited resources - the ANC leadership constantly subjects them to North Korean type exhortations. 

The government needs to be aware that the anti-intellectualism that it embraces is dangerous to our society and to our future. Without the ferment of new ideas and original thought, we will be unable to cope with the 21st century challenges that we face.

Statement issued by Prof Belinda Bozzoli MP, DA Shadow Minister of Higher Education and Training, September 7 2014

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