HONORARY DOCTORATE - NOSIMO BALINDLELA

Rhodes University will confer an honorary doctorate in Laws on Eastern Cape Premier, Nosimo Balindlela, at a special
graduation ceremony to be held in Grahamstown on 10
September.

As part of the University’s Centenary celebrations, honorary
degrees have been conferred on outstanding international and local citizens who have made an impact on and a significant contribution to their respective fields. This is the final ceremony of the year.

Zisiwe Nosimo Beauty Balindlela was born in Hermanus in
the Western Cape in 1949, but her family was forcibly moved to Middledrift in the Eastern Cape where she spent her childhood.

After obtaining a teacher’s diploma, she completed a BA at the University of Fort Hare and then went on to do postgraduate study at British and American institutions. She obtained a Masters degree in Early Childhood Education, Columbia University Teachers College, and completed a four-month course on Distance Education at the Institute of Education, London University. In 2002 she was awarded an Honorary Doctorate from Fort Hare.

Between 1973 and 1994, she taught at various schools and
teachers’ colleges in South Africa, and lectured in education at the Universities of Fort Hare and Transkei.

In the late 1980s she was active in the United Democratic Front as an anti-apartheid activist which led to her dismissal from two of the institutions where she was teaching.

After the unbanning of the African National Congress, Mrs
Balindlela became the first chair of the Women's League in the Eastern Cape, and was elected to the ANC provincial
executive, serving as regional chairperson from 1990–1991.
She was voted as Woman of the Year in 1983 by the readers of the Star newspaper and in the same year was President of the Alice branch of South African University Women’s Association.

In 1994 Mrs Balindlela was appointed as MEC for Education in the Eastern Cape. During this time she was involved in, amongst many other projects, the redesign of curricula and the implementation of relevant material into the educational system. She introduced the Breakthrough to Literacy Project, through the Rhodes University’s Institute for Studies in English in Africa, into ten lower primary schools in the Stutterheim district.

She made great inroads into improving the education system, including the amalgamation of six former departments, breaking down of model C school barriers, construction of new schools and classrooms in disadvantaged communities, establishment of adult basic education and training centers and renovation of schools throughout the province. She also ensured that the twinning agreement between Scotland and the Eastern Cape was more than a public relations exercise by implementing a ‘book appeal’ which resulted in three containers of books being donated by individuals in Scotland and England and distributed to adults and children in the most rural areas of the province.

In 1998 as part of a political manoeuvre to apportion blame for the problems in the Eastern Cape Department of Education, Premier Stofile removed Mrs Balindlela from the post of MEC for Education. After a year as a Member of the Provincial Legislature, she was brought back into the provincial executive in 1999 as MEC for Sport, Recreation, Arts and Culture, a portfolio into which she threw herself with her customary energy.

In this role Mrs Balindlela was a driving force behind securing Buffalo City as the host for the SA Games in April 2004. Recognising the debilitating poverty of the province, she identified sport as being a way for individuals to escape these realities, albeit briefly. She also instituted the ‘Promoting Heritage through Indigenous Games Festival’ in 2002 where she participated in the ugqaphu event – a form of skipping. Her vision was to incorporate these games into the All Africa Games and the Olympic Games and to use this festival to take youth off the street while enhancing training and skills development.

Mrs Balindlela has always supported the various cultural initiatives of the Grahamstown Foundation and played a major role in securing funding from the Eastern Cape Government for the National Arts Festival. She is a supporter of Rhodes University and her daughter is a Rhodes graduate while her son is a first-year student at the University.

Appointed as the first woman Premier of the Eastern Cape in April 2004, Nosimo Balindlela is reported to be tough and
ensures that the job is done. These are qualities she will need in tackling problems in the Eastern Cape, the province with the highest infant mortality and unemployment rates, the lowest rates of formal housing and access to electricity, as well as the in- house burdens of corruption and Maladministration.

In her first address in this position she stated: “As I have always said before, I will never neglect the poor. Together with my team, I will strive to bring a better life to our people.” She has undertaken to forge ahead with poverty alleviation programmes while focusing on transforming the Administration of the province.

Premier Balindlela has proved to be enormously popular among grassroots ANC members in the province and has endeared herself to all by adopting her bare-footed and traditional dress approach when attending official functions.

Those who know Mrs Balindlela say she is a warm and generous person, with the ability to mould a team around her and get the best out of people. Democratic Alliance leader in the province, Athol Trollip, describes her as a “fine example of honesty, integrity and humbleness”.

It is said that ‘true development practitioners should not leave their footprints behind them’ and this epitomizes Mrs Balindlela’s style of work. Her leadership style is one of ‘service leadership’ ignoring the political and publicity spotlight and focusing on delivery and implementation. Her ability to interact with people at all levels, from the poorest to the most wealthy and influential, may have been one of the key factors in her appointment to the position of Premier.

By awarding Premier Balindlela with an honorary degree, Rhodes University will be acknowledging not only an exceptional individual whose contribution to the Eastern Cape has already been significant, but also, symbolically, the province which plays home to our institution and has provided the platform for us to be a leading institution for higher education both locally and internationally.

Tickets for the graduation ceremony will be available at no cost. All interested parties are invited to attend.