US anti-apartheid activist to be honoured by University of Johannesburg

A former friend of the South African black liberation, an anti-apartheid campaigner and renowned US civil rights activist, Dr Andrew Young, will receive an honorary doctorate at the University of Johannesburg current Autumn season graduation Wednesday, ironically a day before the South Africa’s Human Rights Day celebrations.

Young, who was US ambassador to the United Nations at the height of the white apartheid rule in South Africa, championed the opposition to black oppression at the UN gatherings and in the United States itself.

He attended and addressed the funeral of the late Black Consciousness leader, Steve Biko, in King William’s Town, Eastern Cape September 25, 1977, and visited briefly a few years prior.

The university said the current Autumn graduation season, which began on March 14, has a total of 8,000 undergraduate qualifications, as well as 1,961 postgraduate qualifications that will be conferred. Those include 243 masters degrees, and 54 doctoral degrees.

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A university statement said: “During this graduation season, the university will confer six honorary doctoral degrees to outstanding individuals who, through their sacrifices, have made sterling contributions to humanity in socio-economic and political fields of our country, the African continent, and the world at large. The first of the recipients of an honorary doctoral degree is 87-year-old former US ambassador to the United Nations and activist, Dr Andrew Young.”

The university acknowledged Dr Young’s role in changing the course of history as a leader in the Civil Rights movement.

The Honoris Causa degree to be bestowed on him is in recognition of his selfless and tireless contribution towards ending apartheid.

The statement continued: “The honorary doctorate also represents South Africa’s gesture of gratitude to all African Americans who helped to destroy apartheid and rekindle their long overdue collaboration with the African American community.”

UJ’s executive dean of the faculty of humanities, Professor Alex Broadbent, acknowledged Young’s outstanding attributes: “As a leader and key confidante to Dr Martin Luther King Jr. during the Civil Rights movement, Ambassador Young helped change the course of history and built a remarkable legacy as a civic activist, elected official, groundbreaking ambassador, social entrepreneur, and adviser to presidents. Today, he leads the Andrew J. Young Foundation’s efforts to develop and support new generations of visionary leaders who will create sustainable global approaches to economic development, poverty alleviation, and the challenge of hunger.”

He was the first African American to serve as US ambassador to the UN after being appointed by the former US President Jimmy Carter, who was sympathetic to the South African liberation cause. But Young often clashed with Carter’s successor, Ronald Reagan, whose policy of constructive engagement with the Apartheid South African regime Young vehemently opposed.

Young, who was an architect of the first US policy in African policy grounded in human rights, negotiated an end to white-minority rule in Sub-Saharan Africa by bringing in President Carter’s emphasis on human rights to international diplomacy efforts.

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His role to see African economic development and prosperity went beyond the apartheid era in South Africa. In 1996, he co-founded Good Works International, which promotes sustainable economic development in Africa and the Caribbean.

The ANC itself respected Young and during the organisation’s campaigns for the isolation of South Africa, they relied on his support and influence at the UN and the United States in general. He campaigned hard for the release from jail of icon Nelson Mandela, so much so that the party’s Jeff Radebe paid a glowing tribute to him when the former diplomat visited South Africa in 2016.

The conferral would be preceded in the morning by a colloquium with a two-part panel discussion by Young and prominent local and international panellists exploring the opportunities and challenges for South Africa 25 years after apartheid. Another panel would explore the factors impacting South Africa’s progress in education, youth employment, health care, economy growth, and land reform.

Others to be given the honorary degrees were the South African social justice campaigner and global civil society activist, Kumi Naidoo; African-American mathematician Katherine Johnson; the 2016 Noble prize in chemistry recipient, Professor Bernard Lucas (aka Ben Feringa); and the current executive director of The World Academy of Sciences, Professor Romain Murenzi.

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