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02 August 2021 | Story Dr Cindé Greyling | Photo Supplied
A woman of impact, quality and care - Dr Lentsu Nchabeleng.

Dr Lentsu Nchabeleng currently serves as the Deputy Director in the Gender Equality and Anti-Discrimination Office within the Unit for Institutional Change and Social Justice at the University of the Free State (UFS). She manages the functions of the office to deliver high-quality services that advance gender equality and anti-discrimination based on human-rights principles.

What is the best thing about your job?
To bring about positive change by using collective individualism to make a collective impact on the university community. This includes recognising diverse views that fall outside the norm to solve issues relating to gender inequality. Thus, every engagement and response that takes place can help create change.

What is the best and worst decision you have ever made?
The best decision I have ever made was to listen to my inner voice and tuning into the wisdom of my body. The worst decision I have ever made was to negotiate my worth and value, which at that particular moment I thought were synonymous.

What was/is the biggest challenge of your career?
There are so many challenges. I don’t know where to begin.

What does the word woman mean to you?
Being a woman, to me, means a lot of things. It means being a force to be reckoned with. The embodiment of resilience, courage, and love.

Which woman inspires you, and why?
My mother inspires me. She’s an inadvertent feminist. I feel connected to more women through her because of her ability to visibilise the presence of women in all spheres of life. She carries her identities – mom, sister, wife, teacher, friend, grandmother, gardener, leader, listener – with so much ease and I admire her for that.

What advice would you give to the 15-year-old you?
Other people’s perception of you ain’t none of your business.

What is the one self-care thing that you do? 
Watering my roses helps me relax and recharge. I have recently learned the importance of silence and it’s benefits to the mind and body. I usually take 15 minutes every day to sit in stillness and self-reflect. This helps me to delve deeper into my value system and needs, which helps activate myself and social awareness.

What makes you a woman of quality, impact, and care?
I would say that my ability to be vulnerable, to accept my weaknesses, my strong sense of independence and speaking my truth, makes me a woman of quality, impact, and care.
 
 


I cannot live without … my family.
My secret weapon is … it will not be a secret weapon if I reveal it …
I always have … a bottle of water.
I will never … take my life for granted. 
I hope … to see the end of the gender pay gap.

News Archive

Education dialogue opens engagement on legacy of OR Tambo
2017-10-05

Description: Dialogue  Tags: OR Tambo, education, future, students, Africa, activism 

Pali Lehohla, outgoing Statistician-General speaking at the
Centennial celebration of Oliver Tambo.
Photo: Supplied


To celebrate Oliver Reginald Tambo’s centennial year, the Oliver and Adelaide Tambo Foundation, in partnership with the Rector and Vice-Chancellor of the University of the Free State (UFS), Prof Francis Petersen, and Absa Bank, hosted an interactive dialogue session, titled “Educating Africa’s Future” on 26 September 2017 on the Bloemfontein Campus.

Students encouraged to take charge of their future
The event opened up dialogue on some of the current burning issues that affect students in South Africa, societal challenges such as poverty and crime, and how leaders such as Tambo envisaged a free Africa. Prof Petersen highlighted the role that universities played in developing society, in creating leaders and crafting the path to transformation. Other speakers included Pali Lehohla, outgoing Statistician-General, Linda Vilakazi, CEO of the Oliver and Adelaide Tambo Foundation, Nombulelo Nxesi, CEO of Education, Training and Development Practices, Sector Education and Training Authority, Prof Peliwe Lolwana, Associate Professor at Wits University’s Centre for Researching Education and Labour, and Sikhululekile Luwaca, former UFS Student Representative Council (SRC) president.

Education may require a new approach
During the panel discussion that was facilitated by Phiwe Mathe, former UFS SRC President and media officer in the Office of the Chief Whip of the Free State Legislature. The audience raised concerns regarding the future of funding for university study, the securing of employment and possibilities, if any, of entrepreneurship. In response to some of the concerns, Pali Lehohla said the realities of family dynamics in South Africa affected the ability of students to be properly profiled and funded, according to family income, and that most importantly, the solutions to Africa’s challenges had to come from within and not without. Students’ questions gravitated towards the question of whether higher education in its current form was still valuable or whether new models of teaching that would foster inclusion and earlier economic independence would be of better value.

The legacy of OR Tambo continues to be honoured
The notion of education as a driver for the liberation of South Africa and the continent as a whole, poverty alleviation and freedom from colonial rule are some of the building blocks of the legacy of Oliver Tambo. 
Linda Vilakazi reiterated that students and student leaders would benefit from seeing the importance of using a broad-based African approach to the issues that plague them and their peers, rather than seeing their challenges outside of the continental context.  Sikhululekile Luwaca said higher education must be more accessible, and in order to drive change, students should use their education to become future employers rather than employees and change the face of the future themselves as was envisioned by other liberation leaders.
Caption: Pali Lehohla, outgoing Statistician-General speaking at the Centennial celebration of Oliver Tambo.

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