African universities and the African renaissance

On 27 February, 2017 former South African President Thabo Mbeki during his maiden address as Chancellor of the University of South Africa UNISA said the African universities have a special responsibility to strive to occupy the front trenches in terms of producing the ideas and knowledge, cadres, and activists who will drive Africa’s effort to realize the “African Renaissance,”

Former President Mbeki said the African Renaissance means “eradicating the legacy of centuries, and perhaps a millennium, of a demeaning European perception of Africa and Africans, as well as the stubborn material and subjective consequences of slavery, imperialism, colonialism and neo-colonialism.” He added that “as Africans we must define ourselves according to the image of ourselves, exercising our inalienable right to self-determination.”

Although the idea of the African Renaissance is not new to the African continent, it is the most prominent initiative by African leaders such as former President of Nigeria Olusegun Obasanjo, former President of Algeria Abdelaziz Bouteflika, former President of Senegal Abdoulaye Wade including the former President of Egypt Hosni Mubarak to come out of Africa in recent times. Besides being a proposal to harness Africa’s potential, the concept of the African Renaissance is also an effort to remove the sources of conflict in the continent, restore its self-esteem and turn it into a zone of economic prosperity, peace and stability.

Thus the approval in July 2001 by the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) of the New Partnership for Africa's Development NEPAD and a commitment soon afterwards by the world’s richest countries (G8) to launch a detailed development plan for Africa can justly be regarded as a major boost for Former South African President Thabo Mbeki’s vision and other African leaders of an “African Renaissance”. In essence, the concept of the African Renaissance is a challenge for Africans to engage in debate of redefining and understanding themselves: who we are, where we are coming from, and where we are going, our way of life, education, state of mind in this increasingly globalised world and understanding of the world consistent and compatible with a clear African identity.

However, in the face of the African Renaissance is the reality of the African dilemma. For instance, more than fifty years after the process of decolonization, the majority of Africans still remain chained in chuckles of poverty, ignorance and disease. The majority of the African population remains ill educated and living in squalor. Barrell (2000) observes that the continent’s economic and political marginalization in the world economy also appear to be “more extreme than at any stage since the 1960s”.  In fact, Former President Mbeki himself acknowledged this African dilemma at the United Nations Millennium Summit in New York in September 2000, when he noted that Africa’s current poor image is justified due to bad things happening on the continent such as coups d’état etc.

For the African Renaissance to be successful however, there should be essential elements in place. According to Former President Mbeki, these elements include the “economic recovery of the African continent as a whole, the establishment of political democracy on the continent, the need to break neo-colonial relations between Africa and the world’s economic powers, the mobilization of the people of Africa to take their destiny in their own hands and thus preventing the continent being seen as a place for the attainment of the geo-political and strategic interests of the world’s most powerful countries, and the need for fast development and people-driven and people-centered economic growth and economic development aimed at meeting the basic needs of the people” (Mbeki, 1999: 212).

The role of African Universities in attaining the African Renaissance

Thus in his inaugural address as Chancellor of UNISA, former President Mbeki emphasized on the need for the investment in higher education and universities as centers of knowledge and ideas to transform society. But in order to do this, African universities need to represent the African experience, ideas and find its resources from within the African culture. African universities need to liberate African people as well as the international community from inhuman dehumanizing ideas and practices. African universities should aim to provide Africans with ideas, methods and habits of mind which they need to investigate their societies. The African university needs to be relevant and responsive to the needs of the African people from which it draws its identity. The African university needs to respect and acknowledge the culture of the people it is serving.

Thus given its function as universities, African universities must imbue their learners and communities with an African conscious of innovation, knowledge, science, ideas and technology that maximize the positive expression of fundamental humanity and ability to contribute to the growth and development of African community of which the university is a member. To achieve this challenge, the African university must redefine the concept of African-ness, recollect its roots of knowledge production and ideas and localize its curricula to African needs and aspirations. Therefore, in order to attain the African Renaissance, African universities have a critical role to produce graduates who are both critical and creative, encourage students to be thinkers and doers rather than mere accumulators of facts and receivers of knowledge. This is undoubtedly the special role African Universities should play in order to achieve the African Renaissance that former President Mbeki talked about during his inaugural address as Chancellor of UNISA.