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LLB graduate Lizandré Mulder excels in law and athletics

21 April 2022 | Story Lunga Luthuli | Photo Supplied

Moving from Jansenville – a town outside Uitenhage – to Bloemfontein for her LLB studies, things got off to a shaky start for Lizandré Mulder. New in a ‘big town’, the ‘country girl’ felt out of her element and not used to big-city life. Thanks to her lecturers, the journey to a legal qualification at the University of the Free State (UFS) ended with an average final-year mark of 80% for the Law graduate.

Back in Jansenville, Lizandré’s neighbour nicknamed her ‘klein prokureurtjie (little lawyer)’ as she was growing up, because she had a ‘habit of arguing’, which motivated her to choose law as a career. She says, “arguing with facts earlier, has turned into a passion”. “The competitive side of me always wants to win; I guess that makes me the perfect candidate for a future advocate,” she says.

Managing undergraduate studies, Lizandré – who is also an accomplished athlete – says all she did was study and train. “The only thing I struggled with was my sleeping schedule, as I was constantly tired from hard training, and I studied till the morning hours while I had to wake up again early for morning training.”

The track, field, and cross-country runner has received numerous national medals for the sport and will unfortunately miss the invitation to the annual Excellence Awards in the Faculty of Law, as she will be competing in this year’s South African Athletics Championships in Cape Town on 22 April 2022.

Graduating with the LLB degree, Lizandré plans to finish her master’s degree with a possible topic on the legality of human gene editing in South Africa for the purposes of disease treatment or the prevention thereof.

Lizandré does not believe in having a role model, but to “always try to better myself in every aspect of life. I always believed that true inspiration and motivation come from within”.

After completing her master’s degree, Lizandré will decide on her future career path. She says: “I am still deciding whether I want to remain in Bloemfontein or relocate to Potchefstroom, as the latter has a law firm specialising in medical negligence, a field I would like to specialise in. Besides this, the two cities also boast the best athletics coaches in DB Prinsloo, Head of KovsieSport, and Jean Verster in Potchefstroom has mentored South African award-winning runner, Caster Semenya.

“Somewhere in the future, I definitely also plan on doing my doctoral degree in Law,” says Lizandré.

News Archive

Weak states and armed movements – researching the underlying links

2014-08-28

Prof Theo Neethling is conducting research on armed movements in the DRC.
Photo: en.wikipedia.org

Prof Theo Neethling from the Department of Political Studies and Governance is currently conducting research on armed movements in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

“My research is premised on the scholarly insight and argument that in weak states, such as the DRC, armed movements and militias are filling power vacuums that are the result of the inability and lack of military capacity to fight these movements effectively,” Prof Neethling says.

“In this context, the DRC is severely affected by sub-state terrorism,” he continues.

“This is a phenomenon that is intimately linked to the failure to effect sustained development and to consolidate accountable and effective governance in especially the eastern provinces of the country.”

Earlier this year, Prof Neethling presented conference papers on this topic at two international conferences: the Conference of the New York State Political Science Association, as well as the World International Studies Conference hosted in Frankfurt, Germany.

In 2013, Prof Neethling co-edited the book, ‘Post-Conflict Reconstruction and Development in Africa: Concepts, Policy, Role-players and Practice’. He completed this work in collaboration with Prof Heidi Hudson from the UFS Centre for Africa Studies.

“The book revolves around the concept of ‘post-conflict’ and the blurring of military and civilian roles, analysing the multiple roles of the United Nations in the DRC and Sierra Leone, as well as the African Union Mission in Burundi,” Prof Neethling says.

“It also explores South Africa’s foreign policy imperatives in relation to multinational peace missions in conflict-stricken African states, involving military as well as civilian role-players.”

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