Education

Uganda: Makerere honours Mazrui

Institute of Global Cultural Studies, Binghamton University,New York

2009-09-11, Issue 447

http://pambazuka.org/en/category/education/58621

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Since the source of the Nile is in Uganda, and Ali Mazrui’s professorial career began at Makerere University in Uganda, Mazrui has often described his entire academic career as “a child of the Nile.” His Inaugural Lecture when Makerere appointed him Professor was entitled Ancient Greece in African Political Thought but was in fact a salute to Uganda and the Nile in the history of civilization.

AFRICAN SCHOLARS AS ARCHITECTS OF A NEW CIVILIZATION: MAKERERE UNIVERSITY’S MEGA-TRIBUTE TO ALI A. MAZRUI

Since the source of the Nile is in Uganda, and Ali Mazrui’s professorial career began atMakerere University in Uganda, Mazrui has often described his entire academic career as “a child of the Nile.” His Inaugural Lecture when Makerere appointed him Professor was entitled Ancient Greece in African Political Thought but was in fact a salute to Uganda and the Nile in the history of civilization.

Now Mazrui as intellectual son of the Nile is about to be honored in an exceptional way by the land from which the great river begins its long journey to Egypt and theMediterranean. In Sudan the White Nile from Uganda is joined by the Blue Nile fromEthiopia.

Endowed professorial chairs and chairs which bear the name of a major political or cultural figure are very rare on African university campuses. In eastern Africa such endowed professorial chairs are virtually unknown.

However, Makerere University in Uganda is about to break new ground. It is planning to establish an endowed chair bearing the name of Ali A. Mazrui, its first African professor in the humanities in Makerere’s history. In 1965 Makerere had given Ali Mazrui accelerated promotion to full professor of political science in less than two years after he had been appointed lecturer. The following year Ali Mazrui became East Africa’s first indigenous Dean of Social Sciences (all previous Deans having been either British or American).

Makerere plans to raise a minimum of $5 million for the Mazrui Chair and a minimum of another $10 million for constructing a special Ali A. Mazrui Center for Global Studies. Makerere is hoping to raise this $15 million by the time of Mazrui’s 80th birthday in February 2013. Whether Mazrui will be well enough to attend the culmination of the project in 2013 remains to be seen. Makerere wishes him continuing health in the years ahead.

The twin-concept of a Mazrui Chair and a Mazrui Center for Global Studies was ceremonially launched at Makerere University in the third week of August 2009 in the presence of Prime Minister Apolo Nsibambi, other Cabinet Ministers of Uganda, foreign ambassadors, other dignitaries of Uganda, as well as the intellectual elites of Makerere and sister universities.

Ali Mazrui laid the foundation stone of the proposed Center for Global Studies, and then joined a procession from the Faculty of Social Sciences to the main Assembly hall of Makerere’s main building. For health reasons Ali Mazrui was in a wheel chair as the procession marched to the Assembly hall. Mazrui’s wheel chair was pushed by no less a person than the Prime Minister of the country, Professor Nsibambi.

President Yoweri Museveni’s written tribute to Ali Mazrui was distributed at the ceremony to coincide with what was described as the “enthronement of Ali Mazrui”. A special wooden throne had been constructed for the occasion. Mazrui’s enstoolment was described as “an intellectual coronation.”

Professor Museveni saluted Ali Mazrui as “Africa’s illustrious scholar” and “one of the world’s top 100 public intellectuals.” Uganda’s Head of State added the following words:

Uganda is proud and honored to be the “cradle” of Professor Ali Mazrui’s global scholarship and fame. We give him special recognition as one of Makerere’s renowned former Professors and Deans.

President Museveni later received Ali Mazrui at State House, and had a one-to-one private conversation with the Professor for one hour and a half.

In August 2009 Mazrui’s old Faculty of Social Sciences at Makerere awarded him a Citation of Excellence which proclaimed the following:

Makerere, mother of all universities in eastern Africa, immortalizes her world famous son by launching the Ali Mazrui Chair and Scholarship Endowment and the East African Ali A. Mazrui Center for Global Studies in perpetual honor and recognition of Ali A. Mazrui, D. Phil (Oxon) CBS.

Makerere is indeed the oldest institution of higher education in east Africa and the first to award degrees in the region. It produced at least two Heads of State of Tanzania (Julius K. Nyerere and Benjamin Mkapa), several Heads of State of Uganda (including Milton Obote and Y. K. Lule), and one Head of State of Kenya (Mwai Kibaki). This is quite apart from dozens of alumni who became cabinet ministers, ambassadors, priests, professors and such world–class novelists and writers as Ngugi wa Thiong’o of Kenya and Paul Theroux of Britain and the United States.

At his “intellectual coronation” at Makerere on August 11, 2009, the Acting Vice-Chancellor of Makerere, Dr. Lillian Tibatemwa-Ekirikubinza, who was also Professor of law, turned to the honoree and said:

I will thus say to you, Professor Mazrui, that you represent the best of what this institution has consistently worked to stand for…In essence you stand for fearless integrity…You, Professor Mazrui, are an icon of this generation of knowledge seekers.

As for the house on campus in which Professor Mazrui spent his final years at Makerere, the university is considering the possibility of making it part of the Mazruiana project. One option would be to turn the house into the campus residence of whoever will occupy the Ali A. Mazrui Endowed Chair. The second option under consideration is to turn the house into a museum of the history of MakerereUniversity, both colonial and post-colonial. One of the rooms could explicitly be reserved for what are called “the golden years of Makerere” when Makerere MedicalSchool was strong enough to be nominated for the Nobel Prize for medicine. These were also the years when Mazrui was Makerere’s professor and his public lectures always packed the main Assembly hall to overflowing. Dozens of students missed their supper in order to get a seat at one of those public lectures by Makerere’s dazzling professor of political science.

Makerere is planning to celebrate Ali Mazrui’s 77th birthday in the last week of February 2010. The events may include a symposium on “The Global Face of pan-Africanism: From Okot Bitek to Barack Obama.” Ali Mazrui may be delivering the concluding address at the symposium.

The Mazruiana Extravaganza of February 2010 may attract two or three former Heads of State who have had a special relationship with Ali Mazrui over the years. It is also very likely that the occasion will be graced by either President Mwai Kibaki or Prime Minister Raila Odinga of Kenya, as well as by President Yoweri Museveni and Prime Minister Apolo Nsibambi of Uganda. None of them have confirmed yet.

The world’s largest river begins in Uganda, and has fertilized civilizations across the centuries. In August 2009 President Yoweri Museveni recognized Ali Mazrui as one more intellectual son of the Nile who had participated in the narrative of civilization. In the words of Uganda’s Head of State, addressed to Ali Mazrui on August 11, 2009:

I take this opportunity to welcome Professor Mazrui back home to his intellectual cradle. Intellectuals worldwide have benefitted from your tremendous contribution to world civilization.

Drafted by Staff of the Institute of Global Cultural Studies,
State University of New York at Binghamton, NY

Edited by
Seifudein Adem, Ph.D.
Institute of Global Cultural Studies,
State University of New York at Binghamton, New York

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