Science, Technology and Innovation Minister, Professor Blade Nzimande, is today visiting the family of Professor Sibusiso Bengu to offer his condolences.
Bengu passed away on Monday at the age of 90.
On behalf of the Department of Science, Technology and Innovation, and South Africa’s entire public science system, Nzimande extended his deepest condolences to Professor Bengu’s wife, Mama Funeka Bengu, his daughters and son, grandchildren, extended family, friends, and colleagues.
“Prof Bengu holds the distinction of leading our iconic university, Fort Hare, into the democratic era as its vice chancellor in the early 1990s, and also served as democratic South Africa's first Minister of Education. In the latter capacity, he played a seminal role in dismantling the apartheid edifice of our country’s education sector and helped to usher in a single, coordinated, non-racial, non-sexist education system.
“As part of the Cabinet of President Nelson Mandela, he led the introduction of a number of foundational laws that helped to shape the policy and institutional architecture of South Africa’s school and post school sector in the decades following the collapse of the apartheid system,” Nzimande said.
These include the South African Schools Act of 1996 and the policy recommendations of the National Commission on Higher Education that guided government’s efforts to reconstruct and transform the apartheid higher education system.
He also played a pioneering role in facilitating the transition from the Tertiary Education Fund of South Africa (TEFSA) to the now National Students financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS).
“I worked with Prof Bengu in a number of capacities. My earliest interaction with him was in the mid-90s, when I was part of the ANC’s negotiating team at the Constitutional drafting process. During this period, I consulted him regularly on matters relating to education policy. This work helped shape Section 29 of our democratic Constitution. Later, I also worked with him in my capacity as Chairperson of Parliament’s Portfolio Committee on Education between 1994 and 1999, and together we championed a number of progressive education laws”, the Minister said.
The Minister explained that in 2022, he approached him on behalf of government to accept the renaming of what was then known as the Historically Disadvantaged Institutions Development Grant (HDI-DG) to be the Sibusiso Bengu Development Programme (SB-DP) - an honour he accepted with great humility, but was quick to warn the Minister to ensure that this programme does not fail.
The Sibusiso Bengu Development Programme (SB- DP) is aimed at redressing the inequalities that have negatively impacted the development and sustainability of the HDIs and seeks to enable them to respond to cross-cutting imperatives, including decolonisation in higher education; indigenous knowledge systems; the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) and digitisation.
“On a more personal note, Prof Bengu is one of the people who contributed directly to my personal progress. In 1977, as Dean of students at the University of Zululand, he saved me from dropping out of university by organising a student loan to pay the R100 that was required as part of my outstanding fees in September 1977,” recalled the Minister.
“In Prof Bengu, our country has lost not only one of its most committed educationists, but also a model public servant and patriot, who even when his own health was waning, continued to serve his country and people with dignity and integrity. It is therefore no exaggeration to declare that Prof Bengu was one of those who laid the basis for our democracy.
“May we draw much needed inspiration from his monumental and inspirational legacy of selfless service,” the Minister said. – SAnews.gov.za
