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Postdoc research awards keep academic spotlight on Africa

17 June 2020 | Story Charlene Stanley

The International Studies Group continues to keep critical issues in Africa on the research agenda, with two of its postdoctoral research fellows awarded prestigious international research grants.

Dr Hlengiwe Dlamini won a CODESRIA (Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa) award as part of the organisation’s ‘Meaning-making Research Initiatives’. These initiatives focus on supporting research that contributes to agendas for imagining, planning, and creating African futures.

“I was over the moon when I heard that I received this award!” says an excited Dr Dlamini. “The competition was a tough one. Applications were received from 430 female applicants and just 12 were retained, including mine.”

Her colleague in the ISG, Dr Kundai Manamere, who recently signed a book contract with Ohio University Press, has been awarded an African Peacebuilding Network (APN) 2020 Individual Research Fellowship, administered by the American Social Science Research Council.

“I am delighted to have received this award. As an early-career scholar, this is one of my several goals, and achieving it recognises and validates my work. This boosts my confidence and encourages me to keep working hard,” says Dr Manamere.

Examining border disputes
Dr Dlamini’s research project is a comparative study of two border disputes – between Cameroon and Nigeria over the Bakassi Peninsula borderland, and between Eswatini (formerly Swaziland) and South Africa over the demarcation of their borders, and how the international doctrine of uti possidetis juris, as an instrument of inter-state conflict resolution, applies to these disputes.

“The doctrine of uti possidetis juris (literally translated: as you possess, thus may you possess) states that frontiers inherited from colonialism cannot be changed under any circumstance. Cameroon won its case in the International Court of Justice in 2002 in its border dispute with Nigeria and this had a direct impact on Eswatini, which also had a border dispute with South Africa,” she explains.

“The post-apartheid South African governments have been hostile to the idea of adjusting their borders with Eswatini, while the Eswatini monarchy has relentlessly been pursuing what it calls ‘its stolen territories by the British and the Boers in the 19th century’.”

Dr Dlamini will be heading a team of four female researchers from different nationalities. As soon as international flights resume, two scholars from Canada and Sweden will head for Cameroon, while she and another researcher will start with archival research in Southern Africa, before embarking on fieldwork.

“There will be no rest for us. It is incumbent on me to assemble the data collected and use it to write two or three scholarly articles for journal publications,” says Dr Dlamini.

Migration issues and public health interventions
Dr Manamere’s research focuses on documenting the experiences of former refugees and their host communities at Chambuta refugee camp, one of the five refugee camps established by the Zimbabwean government along the Mozambican border in the 1980s to accommodate asylum seekers fleeing from the Mozambican civil war.
“The project explores their experiences and examines their perceptions about conflict, displacement, refugee conditions, and the occurrence of diseases and intervention following a disease outbreak that killed nearly 200 people in August 1992. I use the Chambuta case to reflect on the politics of voice and representation in history – how official reports by governments and non-governmental organisations overshadow the experiences of refugees and host communities.”

The COVID-19 lockdowns in both South Africa and Zimbabwe have delayed Dr Manamere’s fieldwork plans. She will now first spend time collecting information from digitised archives and doing telephonic and online interviews.

ISG a melting pot for international research talent
Both researchers expressed their appreciation for the role the ISG has played in shaping their academic careers.
“By creating opportunities for me to network with renowned historians in my field, the ISG has expanded my circle of mentors. All these opportunities culminated into several achievements, including this award, forthcoming articles in leading international journals, presentations at international conferences, and a book due to be published by the Ohio University Press, one of the leading Africanist publishers in the world. To me, this is the best foundation for a successful academic career, and I am proud to be part of the group,” says Dr Manamere.

“The ISG creates one of the most convivial environments for intellectual production. We are really flying high. The scholars of the ISG are making their mark in different ways. I am very grateful for the Stanley Trapido seminar series and other academic activities that constitute a vital crucible for the cross-fertilisation of our minds and for the acquisition of new methodologies and updates in our disciplines,” says Dr Dlamini.

Prof Ian Phimister, Head of the ISG, says the two researchers have brought great credit to the UFS and the ISG.“By winning such prestigious awards, Drs Dlamini and Manamere show themselves to be first-rate scholars. Their academic commitment and drive are exemplary. At the same time, their research projects, respectively on comparative African territorial boundary disputes and on Mozambican refugees' experiences of civil war, drought, and disease, have significant policy-making implications.”

News Archive

In January 1, 2003, the Qwa-Qwa campus of the University of the North (Unin) was incorporated into the University of the Free State (UFS).

2003-02-07

FREDERICK FOURIE

IN January 1, 2003, the Qwa-Qwa campus of the University of the North (Unin) was incorporated into the University of the Free State (UFS).

While this is merely the beginning of a long and complex process, it does represent a major milestone in overcoming the apartheid legacy in education, realising the anti-apartheid goal of a single non-racial university serving the Free State.

The incorporation is also part of the minister's broader restructuring of the higher education landscape in South Africa - a process which aims to reshape the ideologically driven legacy of the past.

In contrast to the past educational and social engineering that took place, the current process of incorporating the Qwa-Qwa campus of Unin into the UFS is informed by three fundamentally progressive policy objectives, clearly outlined in the education white paper 3: (A framework for the transformation of higher education):

To meet the demands of social justice to address the social and structural inequalities that characterise higher education.

To address the challenges of globalisation, in particular the role of knowledge and information processing in driving social and economic development.

To ensure that limited resources are effectively and efficiently utilised, given the competing and equally pressing priorities in other social sectors.

Besides informing the way the UFS is managing the current incorporation, these policy objectives have also informed the transformation of the UFS as an institution over the past five years.

In 2001, former president Nelson Mandela lauded the success of the UFS in managing this transformation, by describing the campus as a model of multiculturalism and multilingualism. This was at his acceptance of an honorary doctorate from the UFS.

Indeed our vision for the Qwa-Qwa campus as a branch of the UFS is exactly the same as it is for the main UFS campus - a model of transformation, academic excellence, community engagement and financial sustainability, building on the histories and strengths of both the Qwa-Qwa campus and the UFS (Bloemfontein campus).

Realising this vision will be a giant leap forward in establishing a unified higher education landscape in the Free State.

In more concrete terms, the UFS is working towards this vision by focusing on the following areas of intervention: access and equity; academic renewal; investment in facilities; and sound financial management.

These interventions are being made not to preserve any vestiges of privilege or superiority, but precisely to increase access for students from poor backgrounds and to promote equity and representivity among all staff.

The current growth phase of the UFS has seen student enrolment almost double over the past five years, in particular black students, who now constitute approximately 55 percent of the student population of nearly 18 000 (including off-campus and online students).

But it has not just been a numbers game. Our approach has been to ensure access with success.

Our admissions policy, coupled with the academic support and "career preparation" programmes we offer, have resulted in significant successes for students who otherwise would not have been allowed to study at a university.

This will be continued at Qwa-Qwa as well.

Our academic offerings too have undergone dramatic change. We have become the first university in the country to offer a degree programme based on the recognition of prior learning (RPL).

This is not just a matter of academic renewal but of access as well, especially for working adults in our country who were previously denied a university education.

As for the sound financial management of the UFS (including the Qwa-Qwa campus), this is being done not for the sake of saving a few rands and cents, but for the greater value to our society that comes from having sustainable institutions.

It is sustainable universities that can make long-term investments to fund employment equity, provide information technology for students, upgrade laboratories, construct new buildings, develop research capacity, and provide a safe environment for students and staff, as is happening now at the UFS.

As a result of such management, a practical benefit for prospective students at the Qwa-Qwa campus of the UFS will be lower academic fees in some cases compared with the Unin fees.

As is the case with all these processes, there are concerns from staff and students at Qwa-Qwa and the broader community of the region that the Qwa-Qwa campus serves.

To get the campus viable and to ensure its continuation in the short term, tough choices had to be made by the minister of education regarding which programmes to offer and fund.

But we have been encouraged by the community's understanding that these concerns can be addresed over time as the campus becomes financially viable.

Meetings between the top mangement of the UFS and community representatives, staff and students at Qwa-Qwa have laid the basis for building a climate of trust in such a complex process.

We should not be captives of the past divisions but build this new unified higher education landscape that can meet our country's developmental needs.

It should be a higher education landscape that is based on broadening access, promoting equity and social justice, developing academic excellence, and the effective and efficient management of scarce resources. This should be our common common objective.

Professor Frederick Fourie the rector and vice-chancellor of the University of the Free State (UFS)

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