CODESRIA Bulletin Online, No. 8, August 2024 - SYNTHESIS REPORT: Academic Freedom, Democracy and Sustainable Development in Africa: Re-envisioning the Role of the University

Dar es Salaam (7^th–9^th November 2023) and Maputo (15^th–17^th April 2024)

PART I: SETTING THE CONTEXT

Introduction and Background

From 7–9 November 2023 and from 15–17 April 2024, the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA) held two colloquiums on academic freedom in Dar es Salaam and Maputo respectively.¹ They were organised in collaboration with the University of Dar es Salaam (UDSM), which hosted the colloquium in Tanzania, and Eduardo Mondlane University, which hosted the colloquium in Mozambique. The choice of UDSM as the starting point of a series of colloquiums was based on its rich tradition in critical scholarship, which gave rise to the Dar es Salaam School in the 1970s. More importantly, it was in the city of Dar es Salaam that the historic Dar es Salaam Declaration on Academic Freedom and Academic Responsibility was adopted, on 19 April 1990. The colloquiums brought together a wide range of stakeholders to deliberate on the status of academic freedom, democracy and sustainable development in Africa. Participants included academics, publishers, members of civil society and civil society organisations, artists and representatives of student bodies. The reason for hosting these diverse groups of participants was perhaps best summed up by one participant—Simbarashe Gukurume, in Maputo—who asserted that academic freedom was too important to be left solely in the hands of academics and deans.

As a subset of democracy, academic freedom has been one of the issues at the top of CODESRIA’s agenda for decades. Godwin Murunga, CODESRIA’s Executive Secretary, revealed in his opening remarks in Maputo that the colloquiums were a result of attempts to link the struggles of the masses with academic freedom. The colloquiums come at a time when there is a shared concern about the state of academic freedom and democracy. In the Dar es Salaam colloquium, Baruani Mshale spoke about a confluence of crises that warrant thorough investigation by intellectuals as a way of fulfilling their responsibility. These crises are democratic backsliding, economic volatility, rapid population growth, social fragmentation and inequalities, technological advancement and its associated risks, health pandemics and environmental/climate change challenges.

Evidently, global democratic back-sliding has become the reality of the time. In Africa, even small gains made during the so-called ‘Third Wave of Democratisation’ are rapidly being eroded. In addition, African economies have not lived up to the expectations of the ‘Africa Rising’ narrative of the 2000s, which prompts serious questions on the state of development. Moreover, Africa today has the world’s youngest population, in the midst of unemployment and inequalities. Besides, with poor to zero health infrastructure, the continent remains vulnerable to health pandemics and other diseases. In the meantime, Africa is shouldering the burden of climate change with little to no safety net, even when its contribution to the destruction of the environment remains very low compared with the industrialised countries of the global North.

For many in the African academic community, the democratic back-sliding has created a déjà vu moment. It invokes memories of the poor state of academic freedom and democracy in the 1990s. The return of military rule in the countries of Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso and Guinea gives rise to serious questions about democracy and development in those countries and on the continent as a whole. In countries with civilian governments, the promise of democracy coexists with harsh authoritarian tendencies that curtail freedoms and human dignity. On the receiving end of these developments are ordinary citizens. Equally, the academic community has not been spared, and therefore there is a need to revisit the role of the university in the struggles for various kinds of freedoms, including intellectual freedom.

This report takes stock of the proceedings of the two colloquiums, synthesising and analysing the key issues that were discussed. It is divided into four parts:

• Part I sets the context of the two colloquiums and introduces the main theme—academic


• Part II is dedicated to discussing the key issues that were brought up by participants in both colloquiums.


• Part III takes a look at some of the most used methods to undermine academic freedom in


• Part IV concludes by offering a way forward and highlighting aspects of the discussion that CODESRIA’s Secretariat will take up.

The State of Academic Freedom in Africa

Globally, studies show that academic freedom is on the decline. A 2023 report by Scholars at Risk revealed that:

Around the world, scholars and university students face frequent and pervasive attacks on their academic freedom and the autonomy of the institutions where they work. They occur in closed, authoritarian societies, where dissent is viewed as destabilising and the right to think and speak freely is routinely oppressed; and in situations of armed conflict and political crisis, where particular forms of higher education may come under attack. They are also becoming troublingly common in open, democratic, stable societies, where illiberal actors are using the language of rights, freedom, and excellence to push forward their own agendas and erode academic freedom and the autonomy of higher education institutions.²

Joe Oloka-Onyango noted in his keynote addresses both in Dar es Salaam and Maputo that scholars across the African continent have suffered state-invoked attacks, in countries such as the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Cameroon, Egypt, Ethiopia, Guinea, Lesotho, Sudan and Nigeria. Intellectuals in those countries have faced arbitrary arrest and imprisonment, restrictions placed on their free movement, and a panoply of legal and extralegal measures that affect their academic freedom. In the wake of the Tigray uprising in Ethiopia, academics and universities were targeted by government forces as well as the fighters of the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF). A little over a decade ago, in 2013, the Ahmad Baba library in Timbuktu was torched by militants. During our discussion in Maputo, student representative Non-tethelelo Nkambule claimed that she had been arrested many times for taking part in protests and has spent more time in police stations than the time she had visited her grandmother’s place. All this casts a very gloomy picture of the state of academic freedom in the region.

It has been argued that the golden era of academic freedom, when higher learning institutions were allowed to conduct their affairs with relative autonomy, took place between the 1960s and 1970s.³ Several African universities stood out in the exercise of academic freedom at a time when the postcolonial state was still authoritarian. These higher learning institutions included the University of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, the University of Nairobi in Kenya, Makerere University in Uganda, the University of Ghana and the University of Ibadan in Nigeria. The honeymoon did not last long, for the 1980s and 1990s saw increasing state interference. The irony of this is that, compared to the 1960s and 1970s, the African state has become more democratic—at least through the lens of certain indicators like periodic elections—yet academic freedom is deteriorating. This is one of the challenges participants in the two colloquiums wrestled with. It begs the question whether the problem lies with the agents (academics) or the structure (state), as conceived by Bakari Mohamed in Dar es Salaam. In the former, we could ask whether the academic community has done enough to nurture academic freedom; in the latter we could ask whether the state is the obstacle to academic freedom.

Traditionally, the university has been a place where ideas are born, debated and cherished. Further, the university is considered a safe space where academics and intellectuals may learn. Yet, this has not been the case, even in the universities mentioned earlier as the hot-bed of critical intellectual engagement. Today, African universities face threats from multiple fronts. Against the notion that it is the state that poses significant threat to the ideals and principles of the university, it has come to light that the enemies of academic freedom range from the state to culture and customs, university staff and members of academia themselves, industries/the market, as well as outside forces such as external funding agencies. This was made clear in the discussions in Dar es Salaam and Maputo.

In arguing about academic freedom’s enemy from within, Godwin Murunga in Dar es Salaam observed that it is the threat from the academic community that is more challenging. In this case, the perpetrators of suppressing academic freedom are themselves academics, meaning that they are more nuanced, if not more sophisticated, in their practices. Murunga’s assessment of the situation was echoed by Issa Shivji, who reminded participants that his generation fought successfully for universities to be led by academics, at least at the UDSM. But many decades later, academics have turned out to be worse university managers than non-academic administrators in running higher learning institutions. Things are little different when the enemy is outside, as is the state. Only, the state is more visible and its threats are more direct and predictable.

The onslaught on academic freedom has resulted in the deteriorating quality of education, with the university reduced to an institution for producing ‘mechanical’ graduates intended to serve market forces instead of thinkers. Campus activism has now been transformed into collective docility. Academic members of staff and students alike are increasingly becoming apathetic towards anything academic. To demonstrate this, Issa Shivji noted the absence of the UDSM management in the three days of the colloquium in Dar es Salaam. At UDSM, the famous ‘Revolution Square’ where students used to gather to agitate is now the site of a flower garden. Pointing to the death of student activism, participants were informed that the last student protest against egregious abuses at UDSM took place in 2011. The University of Dar es Salaam Academic Staff Assembly (UDASA), once a force to reckon with on matters of social justice and democracy in the country and region, is now a shadow of its former self. This is a trend also in other African countries. Intellectuals who raise their voice at times pay a heavy price. Some, as in the case of Professor Gilles Cistac of Mozambique, have paid the ultimate price of losing their lives.⁴ It is in this context that the colloquiums aim to re-envision the role of the university in an attempt to reverse the trend.

Revisiting the Dar and Kampala Declarations

In his keynote addresses in Dar es Salaam and Maputo, Joe Oloka-Onyango conducted an extensive review of the Dar and Kampala declarations. We present an analysis of his address in the following three sections.⁵

Context

In April 1990, the Tanzanian academic community convened and issued the Dar es Salaam Declaration on Academic Freedom and Social Responsibility of Academics (referred to has the Dar Declaration in this report). A few months later, on 29 November, another declaration was issued—the Kampala Declaration on Academic Freedom and Social Responsibility (referred to as the Kampala Declaration in this report). The latter was organised by CODESRIA under the emerging framework of an Academic Freedom Programme. This development did not take place in a vacuum. The economic and political conditions of the late 1980s and early 1990s created an impetus for the academic community, especially in East Africa, to respond in defence of academic freedom and democracy. Joe Oloka-Onyango pointed out that this period was characterised by major local and international uncertainties.

Globally, a major shift in power configuration was taking place, marked by the collapse of the Soviet Union and the fall of the Berlin Wall. African countries, and indeed much of the global South, were strong-armed into accepting Structural Adjustment Programmes (SAPs) by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, as a way of stabilising their crumbling economies. This development had a far-reaching impact in Africa’s economic and political landscapes. In academia, it manifested in the form of staff retrenchments and cost-sharing policies that saw higher education become commercialised. In the political landscape, the struggle for democracy was gaining momentum and the wave of political pluralism was sweeping across the continent. In response, in many cases, African states resorted to authoritarianism by curtailing civil and political liberties. Subsequent privatisation and liberalisation reduced the role of the state, and coupled with the economic hardship of the time this exacerbated conditions of impoverishment and the marginalisation of the masses. The introduction of cost-sharing policies in the education sector meant that access to education depended on one’s income. This was one of the key issues that the two declarations attempted to address. They were therefore instruments of democracy and social justice beyond the university.

Content and Significance

The two declarations drew inspiration from various international instruments, such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), the International Covenants (1966) and the UNESCO Convention against Discrimination in Education, and the African Charteron Human and Peoples’ Rights. The Dar Declaration explicitly mentions these instruments. Although the Kampala Declaration mentions only the African Charter on Human and People’s Rights, it does refer to other ‘international and regional instruments’. These other international instruments include the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Peoples, also known as the Algiers Declaration (1976), and the Lima Declaration on Academic Freedom and Autonomy of Institutions of Higher Learning (1988). The Algiers Declaration seems to have inspired the Dar and Kampala declarations for the reason that it is more people-centred and less statist.

The Dar Declaration adopted the Lima Declaration on Academic Freedom in its definition of academic freedom as ‘The freedom of members of academic community, individually or collectively, in pursuit, development and transmission of knowledge through research, study, discussion, documentation, production, creation, teaching, lecturing and writing.’ This definition is consistent with UNESCO’s definition of academic freedom as:

… the right, without constriction by prescribed doctrine, to freedom of teaching and discussion, freedom in carrying out research and disseminating and publishing the results thereof, freedom to express freely their opinion about the institution or system in which they work, freedom from institutional censorship and freedom to participate in professional or representative academic bodies.⁶

Both declarations comprehensively articulate the right to academic freedom as a subcategory of human rights. They not only view education as a tool of human emancipation, but acknowledge that the struggle for academic freedom is essentially the struggle for social justice, on university campuses and in the entire society. It is for this reason that participants in the Dar es Salaam colloquium expressed solidarity with the victims of the war in Gaza where universities have been targeted by Israel’s bombs.

The declarations further state clearly the obligations of the state in creating the conditions for academic freedom. The Dar Declaration was essentially local and signatories were all Tanzanian public higher learning institutions, namely Ardhi Institute Staff Assembly (ARISA), Cooperative College Staff Association (COCOSA), Institute of Development Management Staff Association (IDMASA), Institute of Finance Management Staff Assembly (IFMASA), Sokoine University of Agriculture Staff Association (SUASA), and the University of Dar es Salaam Staff Assembly (UDASA). In contrast, the Kampala Declaration is more Pan-African, speaking to the wider African academic community. It could be argued that it is conceptually broader in referring to ‘intellectual freedom’ rather than just academic freedom, which is confined to higher learning institutions. Similarly, signatories of the Kampala Declaration came from diverse backgrounds, consisting of state and non-state actors, including trade unionists, the African diaspora and beyond.

The two declarations laid down the foundation of academic freedom in Africa by adding African perspectives to the struggle. Today, as Oloka-Onyango informed the colloquium participants, twenty-one African countries have incorporated academic freedom in their Constitution. Thus, the declarations have had a jurisprudential impact in the African human rights framework. Despite these strengths, the declarations have their limitations, including, first, issues of gender identity and sexual orientation, which are not given deserved weight. Second, the Dar school was influenced by experiences in public higher learning institutions. At the time, the higher learning space was essentially a public sphere. Today, Tanzania has many private higher learning institutions, the conditions at which are not the same as in the public realm. This very fact presents the need to revisit the declaration and contextualise it to the current situation. Third, the two declarations focus a little too much on academic staff and less on students’ academic freedom. Fourth, and perhaps most important, the declarations lack a solid action plan for follow-up, reportage and implementation. As a result, the status of implementation of the items of the declarations is unknown for the most part.

Relevance

For more than three decades the Dar and Kampala declarations have served as reference points for what academic freedom is and what is expected of an academic. However, during the two colloquiums in Dar es Salaam and Maputo, two issues became apparent. One was the fact that, despite their three decades of existence, the two documents remain obscure to many academics. Indeed, many younger participants admitted to having neither read nor heard about them. Mshai Mwangola informed participants in Dar es Salaam that she has been teaching students from many parts of Africa and none has ever heard about the two declarations. The older participants, on the other hand, appear to be familiar with the two documents. This points to a generational gap that needs bridging.

While this reality is suggestive of the poor state of academic freedom in African universities, it also brings us to the second issue, regarding the critical aspect of the relevance of the two documents. Have they outlived their relevance? To what extent do social, economic, political and technological trends since the turn of the new millennium compel us to revisit the two documents and, if need be, redefine academic freedom? This view was shared by Kwadwo Appiagyei-Afua at the Maputo meeting. These and many related questions remain pertinent to the discussion on aca- demic freedom.

Apart from the declarations’ lack of focus on gender and sexuality, they prompt serious questions around science and technology and their effect on academic freedom, whether positive or negative. The rise of the digital space and associated technologies such as Artificial Intelligence must have a significant bearing on academic freedom. In an attempt to respond to these points, Kwadwo Appiagyei-Afua argued in 2015 that there is a need for an African Charter on Academic Freedom because the impetus that emanated from the Kampala and Dar declarations, towards protecting academic freedom, has dissipated and the historical circumstances that gave birth to the declarations have changed dramatically.⁷ This position was contested by Oloka-Onyango on the basis that the process is more statist. It will involve governments, which more often than not do not have any interest in the matter. Instead, he advocated for upholding Article 46 of the Kampala Declaration, which stipulates that ‘It is incumbent on the African intellectual community to form its own organisations to monitor and publicise violations of the rights and freedoms stipulated therein’.

PART II: KEY ISSUES

Capitalism/Neoliberalism, Human Rights and Academic Freedom

Considering that academic freedom is a subcategory of human rights, there was keen interest among the colloquium participants to discuss this topic. Overall, a cultural-relativist view on human rights prevailed in Dar es Salaam and Maputo. Definitions offered by international human rights instruments such as the UDHR did not seem to give the best explanation of what human rights entail. Questions such as what human rights is and who defines them repeatedly came up. In Dar es Salaam, Hamud Majamba urged participants to think about who sets the human rights agenda and wondered if Africa has its own human rights agenda. To illustrate his point, Majamba referred to the World Bank’s Higher Education for Economic Transformation (HEET) project, the implementation of which requires that UDSM conducts a curriculum review to make it more inclusive of sex, gender, sexuality and disability, to mention just a few aspects. Regardless of the merit of the demand, the question then is to what extent does the World Bank’s agenda align with UDSM’s agenda on such issues? Did UDSM have to wait for the World Bank to review its curriculum? If not, why was the review not done before the Bank’s intervention?

Interestingly, many participants cited homosexuality when discussing human rights relativism. This is not surprising because the position shared by many in Africa is that homosexuality is un-African. A shared view prevails in Africa, that homosexuality is a Western agenda. In Dar es Salaam, this author cautioned that the tendency to refer to human rights as Western values risked crediting the West for what are otherwise universal values. This is unacceptable and should be discouraged. Many human rights for which the West is credited are still contested in Western societies. Human rights sceptics in Africa rightly may question the role played by Western-funded NGOs but not the values themselves, most of which have a universal character. For instance, criticism can be levelled against the West’s human rights regime that focuses on civil and political liberties instead of social and economic rights. However, that should not mean Africans do not deserve civil and political rights. It is important to note that the tendency to dismiss human rights as Western and that they have no place in so-called African culture has been used by governments to trample on fundamental freedoms of African people.

One of the central themes in the discussion about human rights was the debate about capitalism/neoliberalism. Some doubted the role of capitalism in building a democratic society. It was posited that the effect of capitalism is such that the leaders we elect are not our rulers. This argument was put forward by Willy Mutunga in Dar es Salaam, that it is the people behind our leaders—the capitalists—who are our actual rulers. In this regard capitalism is therefore the antithesis of democracy. By extension, capitalism is antithetical to the development of Africa. This was once a widely accepted position in the postcolonial state in many African countries. It partly explains why many African states adopted socialism, solely for the reason that capitalism could not be a viable alternative.

In Dar es Salaam, Adebayo Olu- koshi comprehensively discussed neoliberalism and human rights in his keynote address. We discuss neoliberalism here as an ideological tool of capitalism while being mindful of the conceptual difference between the two. Capitalism and neoliberalism are at times used interchangeably. According to Olukoshi, neoliberalism is perhaps the most destructive ideology in the history of humankind. In relation to human rights, he centred his argument on how neoliberalism has worsened the social and economic rights of Africans. In particular, he criticised the SAPs for rolling back the role of the state and consequently exposing the African masses to the brutal forces of the market. As a result, basic social services like health and education were commodified—further preventing the poor from access to such services. Olukoshi also criticised neoliberalism for its false democratic promises, arguing that what was cited as the ‘democratisation process’ in the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s was ‘democracy in form’ and not ‘democracy in substance’. This is underscored by the fact that the implementation of the neoliberal agenda has gone hand in hand with the state’s attack on trade unions, social movements and citizenry.

The Dar es Salaam meeting included a book launch that was framed under the theme of neoliberalism and human rights. The book in question was the second edition of Issa Shivji’s The Concept of Human Rights in Africa, originally published by CODESRIA in 1989 and republished by CODESRIA just before the Dar meeting. In his presentation, Shijvi stated that neoliberalism has killed the idea of society, citing Margaret Thatcher’s infamous assertion that there is no society, only individuals. Neoliberal individualism is therefore different from individualism as conceived during the Enlightenment, in that it is extreme and hedonistic. Today, according to Shijvi, we cannot even talk about double-standards of human rights because there are no standards to begin with. He referred to the situation in Gaza, where so-called human rights champions have turned a blind eye to the atrocities. Shivji criticised the silence of the UDSM academic community with regard to Gaza. He further explained how the spirit of the Dar es Salaam School ended with the introduction of neoliberalism. For his part, Godwin Murunga condemned the tendency under neoliberalism to give human rights an exotic status, assigning Western-funded NGOs the role of teaching Africans about them. The wrongly accepted assumption is that Africans are ignorant of their rights and therefore should be taught about them.

Furthermore, one of the most pertinent characteristics of neoliberalism when it comes to human rights is its divisive nature. Premised on individualism, neoliberalism also manifests in the form of parochialism, creating narrow identities and separating them from the collective. In academia, solidarity along specialisations and separate departments has eroded the collective whole of the academic community. Likewise, students and academics no longer see themselves as a collective. In Dar es Salaam, Issa Shivji lamented the lack of the staff-student solidarity that had existed in the past. At the moment, each group wages its own struggle, separate from the other. Analogously, Tina Mfanga posited that the neoliberal human rights regime has created an ‘international division of humanity’. Applied to the local context, this division means that the privileged elites are more ‘human’ than the masses of working people. She cited examples of sustained campaigns waged on social media in reaction to the violation of the rights of prominent politicians, and the deafening silence when the rights of the working class are violated even more. In world politics, this can be seen in the Euro-American reaction to events in Ukraine and Gaza. Ukrainians are presented as victims of Russia’s expansionist agenda and thus warranting military and financial support, whereas Palestinians are left to endure collective punishment carried out by Israel in the name of self-defence. This is despite the fact that Israel is the occupying power of Palestinian territories. These events have a bearing on academic freedom given that Israel’s carpet bombing in Gaza has not spared higher learning institutions, which now lie in ruins.

In Dar es Salaam, Sabatho Nyamsenda declared that academic freedom is the struggle between supporters of neoliberalism and progressives—that is, between those who believe that education is a commodity and those who believe that education is a service and therefore a human right. He argued that neoliberal academic freedom is different in the sense that it is narrow in scope. For instance, in neoliberal dictums, academic freedom is for academics and students only. It excludes non-academic members of the university community. It is for this reason that the Dar and Kampala declarations are celebrated for widening the idea of academic freedom to include everyone who contributes to the functioning of a university. Nyamsenda added that the two declarations demand that intellectuals serve the community, whereas the neoliberal perspective replaces serving the community with consultancy work.

Gender, Sex and Sexuality

In Maputo, a panel on ‘Grounding Academic Freedom in Feminist Terms’ shed light on how patriarchy and its structures affect women in higher learning institutions. Although there was no similar dedicated panel in the Dar colloquium, thereby prompting Oloka-Onyango to signal how skewed the gender composition of the Dar meeting was, feminist discourses were very much part of the conversation. The main topic that participants wanted to address was drawing connections between academic freedom and issues of gender, sex and sexuality. Does the suppression of academic freedom affect academics and intellectuals differently, on the basis of gender, sex and sexuality? This is what the participants intended to address, although it must be noted that the discussion was dominated by gender-related issues rather than sex and sexuality. It is clear that, three decades after the Dar es Salaam and Kampala declarations, the overall conditions of women in higher learning institutions have improved. However, this was not delivered on a silver platter but was the result of the struggle, especially by non-state actors (including academics), to push the boundaries of inclusion. Many universities have since established gender centres and developed sexual harassment policies with the aim of providing safe spaces for women. The enrolment of female students into universities has also improved remarkably.

Despite these gains, there are several challenges. In many cases, women still have to contend with the difficult balance between their socially assigned roles as chief caregivers in their homes and their professional life. This has affected their upward mobility in academia, where requirements for promotion for men and women are the same. Moreover, women have found themselves on the receiving end of inappropriate regulations, such as those enforcing a particular dress code. There are reported cases of harassment as management moves to implement these regulations. In many African universities, sexual harassment particularly against women has partly been blamed on their so-called ‘indecent dressing.’⁸ In Kenya, a host of universities have banned ‘indecent dressing’ and in all cases there seems to be a particular emphasis on women dressing.

Sex for grades, various forms of sexual harassment and the general objectification of women in universities have been reported, making higher learning institutions unsafe for women and girls.⁹ It must be noted that this is women’s plight outside higher learning institutions, too. In Dar es Salaam, Anna Hanga presented a study which indicated that the group most affected by sexual abuse is children (47%), followed by women (33%). These abuses take the form of rape (including marital rape) and other physical abuse.

In Maputo, Ana Nhampule and Gracinda Mataveia highlighted several other challenges that women face in academia. A big one is that the male/female ratio is tilted significantly in favour of men in the academic staff category. Where one finds women, most of them are in junior positions, and the number of senior women researchers is lower than that of men. In the colloquium in Dar es Salaam, it was apparent that there were fewer female participants than their male counter-parts. After concerns were raised, it was clarified that the invitations were extended to students but also to staff bodies, which are mostly led by men. While affirmative action to empower women was appreciated, Juvencio Nota cautioned against ‘gender washing’—plac- ing women in academic positions for the sake of numbers rather than merit. Likewise, Godwin Murunga cautioned that there is no universal sisterhood of women, pointing to the fact that there are multiple layers of gender discrimination in the intersectionality of sex, sexuality, race and class.

Again, the question of capitalism emerged, this time in relation to gender. Lyn Ossome in Maputo argued that any attempt to find redress for women’s oppression should address the elephant in the room, that is, capitalism and its ideological tool of neoliberalism. Ossome further explained that neoliberalism creates identities and forces us to choose them. She discouraged the idea of ‘women labour’ and argued for ‘gendered labour’. She explained that what is known as women’s labour can be equally performed by men. In addition, she argued that instead of women’s emancipation the focus should be on the emancipation of all, including men, who suffer different forms of oppression. This task will require that we confront capitalism head on. However, this view was challenged by Fred Fredericks, who argued that confronting capitalism is a long and tedious, mammoth task that would put us in a state of amnesia. Rather, it should go hand in hand with addressing pressing issues of the moment, such as the oppression of women.

On sexuality, Oloka-Onyango pointed out that universities in Africa have become a site of dis- crimination and microaggression on the basis of sexual orientation. In many African countries, governments have put in place harsh legislation against homosexuality and same-sex unions.¹⁰ Not even the university has managed to provide a safe haven for people in the LGBTQ+ community who face discrimination. In Uganda, the anti-homosexuality law has resulted in student-led anti-homosexuality vigilante groups on campuses.¹¹ Research on sexuality has become an increasingly sensitive issue, and is sometimes prohibited. Cesaltina Abreu presented the instance of a research project on LGBTQ+ being rejected at the Catholic University of Angola. In many cases, academics resort to self-censorship

as a survival mechanism for fear of losing their job or facing persecution—this is a good example of how society can curtail academic freedom. Overall, universities have remained silent about the anti- LGBTQ+ wave sweeping across the continent. In Dar, Issa Shivji expressed deep concern about this tendency. He argued that the issue is not whether one accepts diverse sexual orientations but how we ought to treat humans with dignity and respect. This view was shared by Oloka-Onyango.

The question of gender, sex and sexuality relates to the importance of diversity and inclusion. However, diversity and inclusion were not discussed in a comprehensive manner. As noted earlier, gender dominated the conversations more than sex and sexuality. In addition, there was little to zero debate on, for instance, other marginalised groups, such as people living with disabilities. In fact, none of the participants belonged to this group. This is a good point to take forward because the colloquiums are not just about academic freedom but also democracy and sustainable development.

Technology and Academic Freedom

Technology is a major force in the fourth industrial revolution, and the participants paid a great deal of attention to the subject. As indicated above, lately there has been great concern about how Artificial Intelligence (AI), for instance, will impact academic freedom and whether it has any bearing on intellectual responsibility. In Maputo, Severino Ngoenha gave a keynote lecture titled ‘Struggles for Academic Freedom in an Information and Technological Age’, in which he advanced a number of issues.

Ngoenha asserted that the rapid changes in technology have produced different types of humans: pre-humans, post-humans and trans-humans. He warned about the possibility of biological humans co-existing with genetically modified humans. Ngoenha also expressed concerns about Africa’s place in the world of technology, drawing a parallel with the image of Afghans chasing a US military evacuation aircraft at Kabul airport.¹² His argument was that there is a danger that Africa is being left behind in technology and the only thing it can do is play catch-up. In particular, he stated that Africans are not taking full advantage of available technologies, and as a result have become consumers of technologies developed elsewhere. He urged Africa to take measures to strengthen its ‘scientific citizenship’ by learning about the software of these technologies, not just the hardware. In the context of academic freedom, Ngoenha cited online classes offered to Africans by foreign universities, stating that Africa does not have control and ownership of such trends. This view was shared by Oloka-Onyango who, in his keynote addresses in Dar es Salaam and Maputo, expressed concerns about how the onlinisation and zoomification of academic activities has reduced human interaction. Moreover, these online spaces are increasingly used for bullying and state surveillance.

In Dar es Salaam, a panel on ‘Academic Freedom, Democracy and Intellectual Social Responsibility in a Technological Age’ raised a number of issues. Three pertinent questions were posed by Mshai Mwangola. One, how does intellectual freedom progressively advance the transformation of society to deliver the vision of the world the people aspire to? Two, are intellectuals using technology effectively to connect with individuals working in other spaces? And three, are intellectuals using technology in such a way that will guarantee that when their freedom is abused others will come to their defence? These questions are crucial especially considering that much academic research output is either still locked away from the public, on the shelves of university libraries, or is available online but only through a paywall. The point here is how intellectuals use existing technological tools to disseminate research findings. Mwangola further attempted to describe technology as one of the aspects of Frantz Fanon’s ‘international situation of time’, mentioned in the quote below, from Fanon’s Wretched of the Earth¹³:

We must rid ourselves of the habit, now that we are in the thick of the fight, of minimising the action of our fathers or of feigning incomprehension when considering their silence and passivity. They fought as well as they could, with the arms that they possessed then; and if the echoes of their struggle have not resounded in the international arena, we must realise that the reason for this silence lies less in their lack of heroism than in the fundamental different international situation of our time.

Chambi Chachage spoke about access to education, a key component in the Dar Declaration, in relation to technology. He submitted that technology can help us resolve some of our pertinent problems, such as lack of access to education. However, it has a huge price tag in that it requires users to own or have access to gadgets and the internet. His main thesis was that technologies are overlaid on existing structures of inequality in the form of income, race, gender and rural–urban disparities. Therefore, if not used carefully, they will strengthen such inequalities instead of narrowing structural gaps. On top of that, technologies are not value-free. He also cited ChatGPT technology as posing a risk to learning because it can mimic human intelligence. Baruani Mshale argued that digital algorithms feed users with information on similar issues so much so that, if they are not careful, they will end up having a one-sided worldview. To underscore this point, Tina Mfanga lamented the tendency by intellectuals to consume state propaganda through social media that aims to justify the eviction of street vendors in various parts of Tanzania. This uncritical embrace of information exacerbates intellectual irresponsibility.

There were questions around the ownership of technology and who benefits. These alluded to the assumption that it is the developers of technology and their respective countries in the global North who profit. However, this view was challenged by Zitto Kabwe, who said it is rather reactionary to ask these questions. Instead, Africa should focus on developing new technologies and find ways to improve existing ones. As an example, he cited the mobile money transfer system, M-Pesa, which is now one of Kenya’s best exports. To benefit from ownership of technology, African governments must invest in research and development. For his part, Issa Shivji argued against technologies such as M-Pesa, saying that they further help to integrate Africa into the global capitalist system. Once again, the subject of capitalism emerged, to which Baruani Mshale responded that we must not get caught up in the -isms but focus on practical solutions to our many problems.

Culture and Academic Freedom

The university has for centuries been known as an intellectual ivory tower. But it is part and parcel of the society that intellectuals have the responsibility to serve. As such, what happens in the university is connected to what happens outside, that is, in society. Despite attempts to physically separate the university from society, including the erection of physical walls, the university cannot escape from society. Indeed, it is the responsibility of academics to make sure that this does not happen.

The attitudes of the academic community are influenced by the attitudes of the general public. Academics’ views on gender and sexuality, for instance, are likely to be shaped by the norms of the society in which they live. Still, this does not relieve intellectuals from their role to advance scientific knowledge. By norms we mean culture, which is one major society-induced method affecting academic freedom today. As a total way of life, culture is central in advancing or restricting academic freedom. During the two colloquiums, participants pondered the idea of culture and its role in academic freedom. One particular argument was presented for incorporating a cultural element in our understanding of academic freedom. In Mozambique, this was supported by Manuel Macia and Elisio Macamo. The academic community was challenged to draw from African philosophies such as Ubuntu to redefine academic freedom and promote democracy and human rights using more culturally informed approaches.

In Dar es Salaam, Mshai Mwangola revisited Amilcar Cabral, who understood culture as something that cannot be eradicated but should be used as an asset for liberation. Bertha Kibona, on the other hand, questioned whether the ‘Tanzanian culture’ of elderly respect enshrined even in greetings such as “shikamoo” (meaning ‘I hold your feet’) has contributed to limiting student activism as the young people are expected culturally to respect and honour elders. Either way, this query provokes thinking around the relationship between cultures and academic freedom.

In Maputo, Filimone Meigos underscored the centrality of culture in national development, referring to Amilcar Cabral’s assertion that culture is the heartbeat of the nation. It is for this reason that advocating for the role of art and culture in national planning becomes important. Elisio Macamo proposed that in fact the idea of academic freedom is rooted in African culture. He gave an example of how in Tsonga culture the idea of development is about personal development and how we present ourselves to the world. Macamo further argued in favour of embracing and advancing indigenous knowledge in the learning process. This is a move against the use of foreign concepts that speak to specific cultural and historical contexts. Tina Mfanga echoed this point in Dar es Salaam, when she asserted that indigenous knowledge is readily available and will help Africa escape the entanglement of the global North’s domination in knowledge production.

However, culture can also pose an obstacle in promoting academic freedom. In Dar es Salaam, Mshai Mwangola elucidated that speaking truth to power is not just about speaking to the leadership. It is also about speaking truth to society. In many senses, this is what the two declarations meant to evoke in the notion of the social responsibility of the intellectual. Like the leadership, the society is equally a culprit when it comes to imposing norms on individuals. This is where the culture of society becomes an important element when discussing academic freedom. It is the responsibility of intellectuals to challenge existing culture to facilitate its evolution, otherwise it will die. Mwangola premised her argument on Micere Mugo who talked about orature as a human right in her book African Orature and Human Rights. In the book, Mugo develops the onion structure theory, in which she compares humanity with an onion and its many layers. Each layer is important, such that the removal of one layer changes the whole onion. It is a philosophy of inclusion and coexistence, similar to Ubuntu. In essence, the theory ‘transcended parochialism, classism, patriarchy, sexism, heterosexualism and all other confining-isms’.¹⁴ Mwangola also referred to Paulin Hountondji, who described culture as the past (traditions) sending its legacy into the future and how we in the present mediate that transition.

One aspect of culture that usually features in this discussion is religion. The proliferation of private higher learning institutions since the 1990s has opened the way for universities that are owned or sponsored by religious entities. Not all the non-state sponsors of higher education institutions hold values that are consistent with academic freedom and scientific autonomy. Religious views on issues such as abortion, the use of contraceptives and family planning influence the way academics balance divinity and science, very often with the former trumping the latter. Amos Mwakigonja, a medical doctor, told participants in Dar es Salaam that despite his Christian faith he still teaches about evolution (not creation) and the use of contraceptives as a means of protection from disease. This perhaps provides a framework for understanding why, for instance, the Catholic University in Angola rejected research on the LGBTQ+ community because it views it as uncatholic, in the same way that students in Uganda see homosexuality to be unchristian.¹⁵

In Uganda, religious institutions are putting pressure on universities to take a homophobic stance. But according to the Dar Declaration, education shall be secular and religious instruction shall be separate from secular education, imparted to those who want to partake of it voluntarily. Although universities continue to uphold this important tenet of academic freedom by refraining from imposing religious values, it is evident that religion is increasingly shaping the minds and conduct of members of the academic community. In Dar es Salaam, Godwin Murunga revealed that during his undergraduate university days in the 1990s, a major shift occurred in which the strongest and most important form of associational life mobilised around the Christian Union. Without doubt, freedom of worship is an inherent right accorded to all, including intellectuals. Yet, when religious gatherings and group prayers dominate or replace other associational clubs and study groups, this should concern the intellectual community. Murunga called for a full understanding of the shifts in associational life to be able to comprehensively address issues of academic freedom.

It was way back in 2006 when Kwesi Kwaa Prah observed that in one of the universities in West Africa allegiance to pentecostalist confession could influence preference for some appointments in the university.¹⁶ Outside the university, owing to economic hardship, many in Africa have increasingly embraced religion as their only source of hope. Fanatics of religion have consequently managed to attract significant followings with their prosperity gospel, placing the responsibility to a better economic life on divine powers instead of governments. The hope for rewards in life after death has in the meantime replaced the promise of providing bread and butter to starving bellies, which African independence fought for. Incapable of providing social services to its people, the African state has joined the congregation in seeking divine intervention for its economic woes.¹⁷

In Nigeria, the extremist Islamism of Boko Haram insurgents is essentially premised on the prohibition of people from seeking ‘Western education’, which the movement believes is forbidden by God. Although Boko Haram targets primary and secondary education-seekers, its anti-education drive in general makes intellectuals vulnerable to terrorist attacks by the insurgents. In Kenya, Al Shabab militants executed 147 students at Garissa University in 2015, further underscoring the danger posed by such forces on academic freedom.

Global Knowledge Production Matrix

A hegemonic regime exists in the global production of knowledge. The continuing dependency on external funding by African governments and researchers means that the research agenda is always set by outsiders, mainly in the West. Faced with economic difficulties and a lack of financial incentives, African academics have been compelled to fine-tune their research agendas to suit those of donors, in the hope that they will attract funding. Joe Oloka-Onyango dealt with this topic extensively during his keynote addresses in Dar es Salaam and Maputo. He pointed out that donors have their own interests, which are neither altruistic nor benign. Amos Mwakigonja gave an example of a researcher who is funded by big pharmaceuticals and is compelled to massage findings to align with funders interests. He also narrated the struggle of medical researchers in the global South who had doubts over the speed with which the Covid-19 vaccine was developed. Yet they could not speak out for fear of going against the big pharmaceutical companies and for being seen as anti-vaccine.¹⁸

Moreover, a growing number of African universities are getting obsessed with global university rankings. Publishing in Western high-impact factor academic journals is paramount for one’s academic survival and excellence. The purpose of knowledge production is now less about scholarship or responding to the needs of African society and more to help universities climb the ladder of World University Rankings. This trend has led to a domination in knowledge production in favour of powerful global actors in the global North. The emergence of new players such as China equally has added weight to the challenge. In particular, China’s approach to aiding African universities and situating the Confucius Institute within the university has raised eyebrows. Legitimate questions are being asked about how the Chinese presence on African campuses infuses the culture of government censorship that is prevalent in China.

Coloniality and Academic Freedom

Colonialism was not just the physical conquering of territories and domination of their people. It was also an epistemic onslaught on the colonised people. In Maputo, this point was made by Pedro Mzilani, who castigated white capitalism in southern Africa for its plunder and dispossession as well as the mental colonisation it unleashed on Africans. He argued that the two forms of colonisation, physical and epistemic, cannot be separated. The former manifested in land dispossession, among other outcomes, while the latter manifested in the introduction of colonial education, among other things. Mzilani was speaking specifically about the university system in South Africa. In Dar es Salaam, Walter Bgoya expressed concerns about the embrace of English language as a medium of instruction in higher learning institutions in Tanzania. This system has created an ‘English problem’, where students lack good command of the language so much that they cannot fully communicate their thoughts even when they are otherwise quite intelligent. He advocated for the elevation of Kiswahili to the level of scientific language. The decolonial project must therefore deliberate on the language question.

As explained by Fred Hendricks in Maputo, the South African case is a good example of coloniality. He pointed out that any democracy has a paradox, which is political equality and economic inequality. This is vividly on display in South Africa, which has been hailed for its democracy but has 93 per cent of its land dispossessed and in the hands of just a few South Africans. It is the world’s most unequal country. This inequality also manifests in academia, creating the intellectual binary between elite universities (Stellenbosch and Wits, among others) and the rest (such as the University of Zululand). In such circumstances, Hendricks questions the purpose of academic freedom to a people who have been dispossessed. Does academic freedom mean that a homeless person, for instance, will now own a mansion, or a peasant a wine farm? Hendricks’s remarks invoke a discussion on the role of the Constitution in national development, particularly the question of whether the Constitution is an obstacle to development. He cautioned against the obsession with constitutions, citing Foucault, who once stated that the blood of the struggle dries up in the legal codes. Hendricks was echoing a point made by Willy Mutunga posited in Dar es Salaam, that constitutions do not make revolutions, rather revolutions make constitutions. However, Mutunga maintained that constitutions do matter.

PART III: METHODS USED TO UNDERMINE ACADEMIC FREEDOM IN AFRICA

Legislation

In recent years, academic freedom has been on the receiving end of draconian laws aimed at curtailing freedoms. In Tanzania, for instance, these include the Cyber-crime Act (2015), the Statistics Act (2015) and the Electronic and Postal Communication Act (2010) with its Online Content Regulations of 2022. The Statistics Act, for instance, criminalises dissemination of data that contradicts official government data. This provision has since been dropped, in a 2019 amendment, but not before journalists, bloggers and activists had been punished.¹⁹ The Cyber-crime Act has provisions which criminalise posting ‘false’ and ‘unofficial information’ in cyberspace. Likewise, the Electronic and Postal Communications Act (2015)—Online Content Regulations 2022 criminalises any publication of online content deemed ‘false, untrue and misleading’. A combination of these legislations poses serious threats to academic freedom. In 2017, a UDSM student was unlaw-fully detained and questioned by the police after he posted on social media pictures of university buildings with cracks in the walls.²⁰ In trying to navigate such precarious terrain, academics have resorted to self-censorship.

State Interference

One way in which the state undermines academic freedom is through infiltrating staff and student bodies. It has been observed that in many universities governments decide who runs student organisations, university management and staff welfare bodies. Sometimes the state is directly involved in running universities. In Eswatini, for instance, King Mswati III serves as the Chancellor of the University of Eswatini (UNESWA). This practice of the president serving as Chancellor of public universities is observed in many other African countries. In many of these universities, state security agents disguise themselves as teachers, managerial staff or even students. State interference in student politics has become common, usually with the aim of installing student leaders loyal to incumbent political forces. This has been made possible by so-called university bylaws, which are vague at best. Elections in student bodies have become a theatre of competition between ruling party loyalists and perceived opposition loyalists. In Dar es Salaam, Abdul-Aziz Carter, a student, complained that students seen as radicals often have their names removed from the list when they contest for positions during elections. He further told participants that UDSM’s student body, known as the Dar es Salaam University Students Organisation (DARUSO), does not represent the interest of the students.

This prompted a response from Antiphas Panda, speaker of DA-RUSO’s parliament, who argued that the body is autonomous although he acknowledged interference from ‘other forces’—not just the ruling party. Panda even claimed that academic freedom is guaranteed at UDSM, stating that the only problem is that of democracy, in that there are challenges in exercising their democratic rights. He went on to praise UDSM top management, saying it was subordinates in the university hierarchy who were problematic.

These contradicting accounts, taken in context with other mechanisms used by the state to control universities, point to the fact that student bodies have been coopted by the university management. The clearly opposing positions indicate that students are divided, one group of students pitted against the other. This tendency has resulted in a fractious atmosphere where it is now difficult for students to have a common position on issues that affect their interests. In addition, postgraduate students tend to shy away from student politics, further adding to the lack of a unified front to advance students’ welfare. At UDSM, external interference has in the past led to student body elections being suspended or the results being nullified.

At the same time, government leaders openly speak against what they call the politicisation of the campus. Their answer is to depoliticise the university. Vaguely defined, depoliticisation of the university means different things to the state and students. For the state, depoliticisation entails containing political elements who are critical of the government for fear that they could form an organised opposition. This is not entirely impossible, having seen the Zimbabwe opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC), which was born out of student politics. Suppressing critical voices goes hand in hand with ban- ning discussions on what are considered to be politically sensitive topics. Shokale Dlamini gave the example of the University of Eswatini (UNESWA), where certain topics of discussion were scrapped from the programme days before a conference was held at the university. While containing critical voices on campuses, governments are at the same time promoting elements of ruling parties, a strategy which can be described as depoliticisation by politicisation.

To address this problem and give more autonomy to students, Abdul-Aziz Carter proposed several measures: reduce the power of the Dean of Students, amend the bylaws and stop the interference of the ruling party, in particular its youth wing. Yet to implement these recommendations requires an action plan along with sustained agitation, not just by the students but by other stakeholders, such as UDASA. Malvin Thongo advised that a piecemeal approach should be adopted in which one is not too ambitious to change the entire university at once but addresses one aspect after another.

Recruitment and In/Security of Tenure

In many countries, universities have had their power to recruit reduced as governments have either fully taken over the hiring and firing of academic staff or have become part of the recruitment process. In Tanzania, for instance, although recruitment in public universities is largely done by the institutions themselves, a newly introduced rule stipulates that there should be a government presence in the recruitment process through a representative. In addition, in the name of vetting, all the names of selected and appointed university leaders must be submitted to the government for approval, essentially with the intention of installing government loyalists in higher learning institutions. In Dar es Salaam, Hamudi Majamba gave an anecdotal account of the process, saying that appointees are given induction courses, in which they are lectured by, among others, government security agencies.

The approval process by authorities outside the university sometimes takes time. In some cases, many university leadership positions are either filled by acting leaders or left vacant altogether. This was pointed out by Julius Nywenya and Robert Kakuru in Dar es Salaam who revealed that, in some situations, an acting leader may serve for three years waiting to be approved or replaced by a substantive leader. Kakuru told participants that at Makerere University the position of Deputy Vice Chancellor: Finance and Administration had been vacant for six years! This is damaging because when there is an acting leader, no substantive decisions can be made. In most cases, the acting leader is inclined to rule in favour of appointing authorities. Following efforts to demand the powers to recruit, the government in Tanzania appears to have compromised, but not without a price. Ng’wanza Kamata revealed that the government has agreed to give universities autonomy to hire on condition that they pay their salaries! This, of course, is contrary to the Dar and Kampala declarations, which call for the state to ensure adequate funding to higher learning institutions.

In addition, the Dar Declaration demands that no teaching or re-searching member of the academic community shall be transferred to another post or position within or outside the institution without her/ his prior consent. This is, however, no longer the case because academics are now considered public servants who can therefore be transferred as the authorities see fit. This has gone hand in hand with the fact that public universities can no longer retain their retired academic staff on a contract basis even when they want to. It is the government that has the discrete power to renew contracts for retired academics, a power that can be abused to target academics considered to be government critics. Along with this comes nepotism. Recruitment in higher learning institutions is being done in suspect ways. Oloka-Onyango gave an example in Makerere, where the Chairperson of the University Council is the niece of the minister of education, who happens to be the First Lady of the country. Furthermore, her son-in-law is the chairperson of the recruitment board. It goes without saying that the minister’s husband is the country’s president, who is the visitor to the university! Robert Kakuru underscored this point, arguing that in some cases the ruling party’s cadres are purposely placed in universities and groomed to take up leadership positions.

Fiscal Control

As previously indicated, the Dar and Kampala declarations demand that the state funds education. To this effect, the state is asked to allocate 1% of its GDP to research and development, as set by the African Union. Since the 1990s, governments have gradually but steadily withdrawn from funding public universities, a move which has created a dire financial situation in higher learning institutions. In public universities, it is the government that determines fees. These universities cannot even make a decision on the number of students they can enrol. The fees are imposed, and so is the number of students to be registered. This situation has resulted in overcrowding with limited facilities. Most universities currently lack the basic infrastructure to support the ever-growing numbers of students, such as accommodation and public utilities.

Apart from this, fiscal policies in some countries have created centralised financial systems where revenues generated by universities are sent to the national treasury. Such is the practice in countries such as Ghana, according to Kwadwo Appiagyei-Afua. The central government then disburses the funds to cater for its various needs, which may not necessarily mean sending the money back to universities. This tendency has created a situation where universities are highly dependent on the central government to meet their financial needs. At the same time, academic staff are significantly underpaid and there are few or no incentive schemes. This has led to a state of low morale across the academic community. It makes it difficult for cash-strapped academics to ‘delink themselves or their universities from the yoke controlled by the state’.²¹

Fiscal control also takes place in the form of unequal resource distribution within the country. Resource allocation has in most cases been channelled in favour of government capitals and urban centres at the expense of other places considered periphery. In Mozambique, Arsenio Cuco lamented the tendency to allocate significant funding to higher learning institutions in Maputo. As a result, regions such as Rovuma have been under-funded. He stated that the farther one moved from Maputo the fewer the opportunities. This practice speaks to broader issues of uneven development. It points to how in-country regionalism and marginalisation can create bigger political problems, such as one facing Mozambique at the moment—the rise of insurgency in the northern part of the country.

Clampdown on Students and Staff Activism

The frequent deployment of security forces on campus is an emerging trend and is becoming a matter of concern.²² It goes against the spirit of the Dar Declaration, which states that the deployment of security agents on campus should happen only when there is clear danger to life or property, and that the deployment should be done only at the request of the head of the institution in consultation with relevant committees. It seems that security forces are being deployed on campuses even when there is no clear danger to life and property. This has been helped by a high degree of compliance by university management, which offers no pushback to such practices.

Commercialisation of Education

The commodification of education has reduced students to clients and universities to paid service providers. This has created a buyer-seller relationship, turning universities into a market where education is sold and bought. Like a marketplace, universities are now overcrowded, at the same time as they are understaffed. In Maputo, Shokale Dlamini informed participants that UNESWA has six staff members only in its history department. Student loans are often not issued timeously, and those who fail to pay tuition fees on time are blocked from taking part in class assignments and university examinations. They are allowed to write their assignments/examinations immediately after they complete the payment.

Because students are now customers, failing them is bad for business. In Dar es Salaam, Gerald Shija expressed concerns over a tendency in African universities where rules are sometimes bent to appease students. In some cases, students would for instance be allowed to write their exams even though they had failed to attain the minimum requirements of test marks or attendance or both. In related cases, lecturers would be summoned by the university management and questioned when students had failed their exam considerably. This new reality is having far-reaching effects on the quality of education. According to a study conducted by the Inter-University Council for East Africa (IUCEA) and the East African Business Council (EAB), for instance, more than 50 per cent of university students in the region are ‘half-baked’, lacking the necessary skills for the job market.²³

Bureaucratisation of the University

In many cases, universities are run by managers whose inclination to exercise bureaucratic control infringes academic freedom. For public universities, the bureaucratisation of the university has transformed public higher learning institutions into mere government departments. In Dar es Salaam, participants were told that UDSM has recently changed its letterhead to include Tanzania’s coat of arms. The letterhead starts with ‘United Republic of Tanzania’, followed by ‘Ministry of Education, Science and Technology’ and lastly ‘University of Dar es Salaam’. This has gone together with questionable staff and student mechanisms of control and monitoring. At UDSM, a guest speaker requires prior authorisation and has to indicate the topic of the lecture beforehand. Likewise, dignitaries such as ambassadors are received by the Vice Chancellor only. In one example, Issa Shivji narrated how the School of Law at UDSM failed to host a book launch of a title by its celebrated alumnus, former Chief Justice of Kenya, Willy Mutunga. The reason given was that protocol required him to be received only by his counterpart in Tanzania. This practice has discouraged lecturers from inviting guest speakers.

In addition, academic staff who plan to travel outside Tanzania have to obtain a travel permit, application for which should be logged fourteen days prior to the day of travel. The long process has to be approved by at least four levels of the country’s public service. Such a tedious process has significantly hampered the mobility and flexibility of academics. Moreover, within universities, in the name of quality control, various measures that infringe academic freedom have been introduced. They include systems that monitor teachers and students’ attendance, and the introduction of dress codes.

The bureaucratisation of the university has had a negative impact on collegiality among members of the academic staff. Those working in positions of power at universities are no longer academic colleagues but patrons whose job is to implement rules and regulations on their inferior subordinates. This is paralleled by the robotisation of human resources. In Dar es Salaam, Robert Kakuru spoke about the categorical imperative of academic freedom where humans are treated as a means to an end rather than an end in themselves. The situation has not been helped by lack of incentives, poor pay and poor teaching infrastructure. Sabatho Nyamsenda added that postgraduate students are exploited by assigning them tutorial roles for which they are either underpaid or not paid at all.

Unethical Practices

The idea of academic freedom as described in the Dar Declaration has implications for social responsibility of academics. It is for this reason that social responsibility remains central to academic freedom discourse. Robert Kakuru drew from his experience to argue that, in essence, universities are supposed to function on principles of fairness and justice. However, at Makerere, the justice infrastructure has been under attack. He cited the decision taken by authorities to suspend the Makerere Staff Tribunal, meaning that any violation of the rights of staff cannot be appealed. The situation has made it difficult when handling staff affairs.²⁴

On the other hand, many academics have also displayed a general lack of professional ethics. At each colloquium, student representatives complained about their lecturers. In Maputo, Mlamuli Makhoba described the toxic environment created by lecturers not honouring their duty. He stated that lecturers were always absent, busy in meetings and conferences. In Dar es Salaam, Abdul-Aziz Carter complained about the tendency of lecturers not to embrace criticism. Indeed, some academics have been implicated for corruption (including sex for grades), embezzlement of resources, nepotism and dictatorial attitudes. It is crucial to note that such practices also extend to students and their respective bodies. Other academics have become semi-gods to their students. They impose ideas on students, skip classes at will without any repercussion and are even hostile to criticism from students. In Maputo, Tiffany Banda put the blame on academics for making the situation difficult for themselves simply for not behaving professionally. In most cases, it is the students who are on the receiving end of such practices.

A lack of ethics creates an undemocratic culture which then produces a toxic learning environment, practically disabling students from acquiring democratic habits. These problems, and others, have provided justification for the state to control the university. This is to say, much as the state has been in the wrong in curtailing academic freedom, its interference has in some cases been justified, thanks to malpractice by members of the academic community. It is therefore the responsibility of the academic community to be ethically professional in order to defend academic freedom.

Student-on-Staff Violence and Other Forms of Assault

Violation of the right to academic freedom on campuses usually involves academic staff against students than the other way round. This is understandable because the asymmetrical power relations tend to implicate academic staff and generate sympathy for students. In both Dar es Salaam and Maputo, violations of academic freedom caused by students hardly featured. It was Bertha Kibona in the Dar es Salaam colloquium who reminded participants about this issue when she probed whether there were cases of students violating academic freedom by assaulting members of the academic community or destroying property. Indeed, student activism has not always been peaceful. In some cases, it has led to the destruction of property and physical and emotional harm to the members of university community and beyond.²⁵ In South Africa, one study implicated students for engaging in acts of violence against not just members of staff but also other students.²⁶ In such cases, the deployment of security forces on campuses has been justified as the right measure to create a peaceful learning environment. Other student assaults against members of staff have manifested in cyberbullying in the form of defamation. Incidents where members of academic staff are named and shamed online by students have become common, at times on the basis of fictitious accusations.

 

PART IV: CONCLUSION AND THE WAY FORWARD: WHAT TO DO

Building National, Regional and International Networks

To move forward as a force of change, intellectuals must build networks within and outside their respective countries. In Dar es Salaam, Robert Kakuru talked about horizontal and vertical networks. The former is networks among academics themselves, and the latter is networks with other actors outside the higher learning institutions. The starting point of vertical networks lies immediately outside

the society. After all, the university cannot be a closed ghetto, argued Severino Ngoenha in Maputo. Also in Maputo, Achia Anaiva expressed concerns that the understanding of academic freedom can be limited in society. However, that would not be the case in a situation where organic links existed between academics and the society.

The scope of horizontal and vertical networks must be national, regional, continental and international. Unfortunately, this has not been the case. In some African countries, academics have been pursuing parochial agendas, confined to their specific universities. In some cases, solidarity among academics of the same university is lacking. As a result, the academic community now has a lonely, weak position that makes it vulnerable to outside forces. Experience indicates that solidarity is important in defending academic freedom. Ng’wanza Kamata reminded participants in Dar es Salaam and Maputo that it was the African academic community who campaigned for the release of Professor Wamba dia Wamba, who had been detained in the DRC. At UDSM, a committee that campaigned for Wamba’s release was later transformed into UDASA. In Ethiopia, it was partly the intervention of the global academic community that led to the release of Professor Berhanu Nega from prison in the 1990s. Academic associations wrote letters to the Ethiopian government and international organisations pleading for his freedom. The same mobilisation took place when Ibrahim Abdallah lost his job at the University of Sierra Leone. It was clear that academic exchanges among African academics should be encouraged with the purpose of sharing experiences.

The task ahead, therefore, is to move the struggle for academic freedom first from the university to national, regional, continental and global frontiers. At the regional level, Robert Kakuru advised that the Inter-University Council of East Africa is a good starting point to build a strong academic freedom regime in the region. Similar initiatives could target other regions of the continent. Mohamed Bakari suggested that a regional mechanism be established to adopt a naming-and-shaming strategy for violators of academic freedom. In addition, academics ought to build coalitions with not just other academics but also like-minded actors in the public and private sphere as well as global civil society. At the UDSM colloquium, Sabatho Nyamsenda spoke about the Ujamaa Collective, a grassroots network which brings together young socialists in the East African region and the continent broadly. Through similar initiatives, Nyamsenda and his colleagues have managed to produce publications that speak to the working people in the region. One of these is an edited book titled Wamachinga na Haki-jiji (which translates to ‘Street vendors and the right to the city), written in Kiswahili to make it accessible.

It was also suggested by Anna Hanga that academics could make use of human rights activists from civil society organisations who, by the nature of their job, could ‘make noise’ to amplify the voices of academics. In addition, it was noted by Willy Mutunga that governments that oppress other people also oppress their own people. He used this statement to call for solidarity beyond national borders. Therefore, beyond Pan-Africanist solidarity, African academics ought to build bridges that connect them with not just the global South but also the global North. The African struggle for academic freedom must therefore be Pan-Africanist as well as internationalist.

Yet, to be able to build such networks, deliberate efforts must be made to dismantle the communication barriers that exist between academics. One of these barriers is language. It is evident that, for instance, the linguistic division of Africa into Lusophone, Anglophone and Francophone countries creates a problem. Itself a colonial making, the balkanisation of Africa into these groupings has promoted ‘othering’ tendencies among Africans, weakening the much-needed continental unity in the process. It has also promoted the idea of identitarianism along colonial histories, compelling Africans to choose and embrace superficial identities. To break from such colonial confinement, an intellectual movement that is both Pan-Africanist and internationalist is imperative. It would cultivate a sense of solidarity among academics on the continent and beyond. It is in this spirit that the founders of CODESRIA saw the need to situate the organisation in Senegal despite the political leverage of English-speaking communities in Africa. The same logic was behind CODESRIA’s decision to hold its second colloquium on academic freedom and sustainable democracy in Mozambique, a Lusophone country.

Decoloniality and Critical Scholarship

With coloniality comes decoloniality. To define decoloniality, one needs to distinguish it from coloniality, which is an assumption that ‘colonial relations continue to shape and ground our present-day political, economic, social and  knowledge systems’.²⁷ De-coloniality, therefore, is a theory that attempts to break with past colonial realities that continue to shape present relations between the once-colonised people and their erstwhile colonisers. Overall, decoloniality is an intersection of feminist, anti-racist, anti-imperialist and anti-capitalist struggles. It is therefore a multifaceted attempt to transform societies in the global South by redefining neo/ colonial relations. The very idea of decoloniality is rooted in the fact that the postcolonial African state did not complete the transition to democracy, as argued by Lyn Ossome in Maputo. As a result, the struggle for academic freedom in Africa is waged in an environment where the state still maintains its colonial identity, manifested in its antidemocratic nature. Any attempt to exercise academic freedom will require that academics confront this inherent colonial structure—in other words, to decolonise the state.

Another step forward would be to decolonise academia, with the aim of filling it with critical, vanguard intellectuals. This was a point made by Jose Castiano in Maputo. There is a shared concern that the young generation of intellectuals lack critical scholarship and that this is due, in part, to their being products of a neoliberal education. The old generation, too, was a product of a similar colonial education. However, it was their courage to resist and offer alternative approaches to dominant colonial and national autocratic narratives that stands out to this day. We are informed that Ali Mazrui, for instance, had the courage to debate and publicly criticise Akeno-Odok, the top security official in Uganda at the height of Idi Amin’s dictatorship in Uganda. In another example, the Dar es Salaam School was known for its leftist radical scholarship in the 1960s and 1970s, making the University of Dar es Salaam the Mecca of revolutionary scholars from the continent and the African diaspora in the Caribbean and Americas. This rich intellectual tradition has since been replaced by a neoliberal intellectual tradition, which has subsequently reduced the overall quality of intellectual engagement.

In Dar es Salaam, Christian Noe, Principal of the College of Social Sciences, revealed that the current generation of intellectuals uses mainly quantitative research. As a result, it does not have the tools of critical scholarship that the old generation had. A similar trend is observed elsewhere in other African countries, so much that the idea of reviving the spirit of the Dar es Salaam School is now, commendably, one of the top priorities of UDSM’s College of Social Sciences. Noe informed participants that her college has taken three steps in that direction. One, reviving the spirit of the Dar es Salaam School with the aim of reclaiming UDSM’s lost space in social sciences research. The collaboration with CODESRIA to put together these colloquiums is part of this initiative. Two, launching a seminar series where researchers are invited to share their research not just with the UDSM audience but the world at large since the seminars are both physical and virtual. Three, since 2014, the college has launched the Voice of Social Sciences (VSS) conference, which is an international event that brings together social scientists from across Africa and the world.

Moreover, it is suggested that one way of changing the tide against critical scholarship is by introducing a critical pedagogy in schools and higher learning institutions. Such a pedagogy would have to consider African history and realities, which are found in diverse African indigenous knowledges, cultures and histories. Any attempt to formulate an Africa-centred pedagogy would have to consider this basic fact. Indeed, the realities differ from one African country to another, and therefore the urgency, need and tools of decoloniality will therefore vary in degree, but not in content. For instance, it is logical that conditions in countries such as South Africa warrant an immediate decoloniality discourse, given the severity of coloniality there. It is unsurprising that students in South Africa were the first to initiate de-colonial movements such as #Fees-MustFall, Rhodes Must Fall and Gandhi Must Fall. However, while this is commendable, it is certainly not enough. Such attempts must also emphasise a student-centred approach to learning. This is im- portant in addressing the undemocratic learning environment, which manifests in top-down teaching practices where the teacher apparently knows everything. A student-centred approach gives students ownership of the learning process, empowering them to be innovative. It also helps students to acquire and adopt democratic habits.

Re/Engaging the State

Re/engaging the state poses one serious question: Should academic freedom be absolute? Two opposing views were presented about the role of the state in promoting academic freedom. The first was presented by Issa Shivji in Dar es Salaam. He opined that in essence the state is an authoritarian entity with little or no interest in academic freedom. The idea that academics need to be regulated by rules imposed by the state is therefore inconsistent with academic freedom. Accordingly, the assumption that the state is a stakeholder of academic freedom is fallacious. The state owns the instruments of violence, so it cannot be for freedom. In response to the call that academics ought to balance academic freedom and adherence to the laws of the land, Shivji responded that academic freedom is measured against intellectual responsibility, not by the rules imposed by the state. Such rules, he argued, must be formulated and implemented by academics themselves. The architects of the Dar and Kampala declarations knew this and so associated the two instruments with the popular struggle of the masses. In Maputo, Lyn Ossome argued that the postcolonial state is an illegitimate entity, and that engaging with it is to legitimise it. The logic is that, once granted certain rights/ freedoms, the state will demand something in return, a situation which can result in co-optation. Any attempt to engage with the state should therefore be mindful of risks and advantages.

On the other hand, historical accounts of the struggle for academic freedom do not exclude the role of the state. In Dar es Salaam, Amos Mwakigonja argued that the state is an integral part of the community, and a key player at that. He called for the intellectual community to learn how to live with the state. Likewise, Noella Karemera argued that there cannot be absolute freedom, calling for some kind of regulation which does not necessarily restrict academic freedom. She added that academic freedom and the autonomy of the university differ from one country to another. In support of this view, Sylvie Dusengimana argued that, although In Rwanda there are challenges (such as the problems associated with lecturers and their (mis)treatment of students), there is less interference from the state, particularly in student politics. In this regard, it can be said that one needs to be more specific when assessing academic freedom. Freedom can be exercised in one aspect and suppressed in another. There is, however, evidence from the literature where the state adopted a neutral steering role in setting the mandate of the higher education system towards addressing broader national and developmental objectives.²⁸

In both the Dar and Kampala declarations, calls were made for the state to create a conducive environment for academics to exercise academic freedom. Room for engaging with the state therefore exists. The purpose here is to work with like-minded state actors. Experience can be drawn from Tanzania in the 1970s. Despite its authoritarian tendencies then, the Tanzanian state still afforded intellectuals at the UDSM a degree of academic freedom that was crucial in giving UDSM an identity and enabling the creation of the Dar es Salaam School, thanks to the country’s intellectual president, Julius Nyerere. Walter Bbgoya gave an anecdote of how the president himself, for instance, gave the green light to the publication of Issa Shivji’s pioneering essay ‘Silent Class Struggle’, in 1970. The essay had been seen as critical of the Tanzanian state by some actors in the government, who had asked Nyerere to ban its publication. In a more or less similar example in this regard, Zitto Kabwe narrated how he and other students were arrested for protesting against the IMF in Dar es Salaam in the early 2000s. They were released after the president, Benjamin Mkapa, intervened, most likely because his position towards the IMF was similar to that of the protesters. These experiences suggest that perhaps the debate should not be whether it is important to engage with the state but rather when and how. That said, the state should certainly not be engaged with on the basis of regulations but rather on issues such as funding public universities. Universities should instead regulate themselves.

Embracing Diversity and Inclusion

To create a conducive environment for academic freedom, the academic community must embrace diversity. Despite efforts made in the struggle for gender equality and equity, discrimination against women in particular still exists on African campuses. The effort of gender mainstreaming to realise gender equality and equity must continue with the aim of removing the barriers that hamper women’s progress. The academic community must also be exemplary in embracing the diversity of sexualities. Specifically, the university must play a leading role in cultivating a culture of tolerance for minority groups, such as the LGBTQ+ in particular, through research and engagement. In the same breath, other minority groups, such as people with disabilities, must be part and parcel of the university agenda to create an atmosphere of inclusion and belonging. The same spirit should be extended to inclusion, regardless of ethnicity, race and class.

More Research

Academic freedom in Africa is still not well-researched. In particular, there is no significant body of research on this topic by African scholars. In Maputo, Carlos Cardoso called for more empirical research on academic freedom. His concern was that the existing body of research is too general and does not focus on specific aspects of academic freedom. This view was supported by Fred Hendricks, who called for more research that will establish the actual agency of academic freedom rather than just depending on a Constitution. Indeed, the importance of research cannot be overemphasised.

Resource Mobilisation

While continuing to press governments to fund higher learning education, a call was made for the academic community to find ways for alternative funding. In Maputo, Carlos Cardoso recommended that we strengthen our capacity to mobilise resources, such as establishing units/departments primarily for the purpose of consultancy services and resource mobilisation. In Maputo, Jose Octavio van Dunem urged that we have to be pragmatic and diversify sources of funding while maintaining our credibility. Godwin Murunga, for his part, called for more understanding of the dynamics and politics of funding.

Specific Measures to be Taken by CODESRIA

Godwin Murunga announced that CODESRIA will revitalise its Academic Freedom Programme and facilitate the establishment of regional hubs in the five regions of its Council for this purpose. In doing so, CODESRIA committed to doing the following:

• Invest resources on academic freedom in the East African region including Ethiopia. Such investment will be in the form of supporting research and publication on academic freedom and capacity-building through events such as the two colloquiums in Dar es Salaam and Adopt an inclusive approach that will bring to the table academics as well as people and institutions that play different roles in knowledge production.


• Intervene to provide assistance to scholars in distress.


• Revisit the Kampala Declaration by convening a continental-level meeting to review the Kampala Declaration as part of the agenda of broadening our discussion of academic freedom. CODESRIA will work with UDSM, among other institutions, to make this


• Lead the effort of popularising the Dar and Kampala declarations to cultivate awareness. In particular, this effort must target the younger generation of academics and students.


• Advance efforts to make indigenous and endogenous knowledges an integral part of knowledge production with the aim of including them in the


• Initiate a process of putting in place a plan of action with the aim of creating an implementation strategy for the Dar and Kampala declarations as well as broader academic freedom instruments. This effort will focus on developing an African academic freedom index, which will establish mechanisms of monitoring, reportage and ranking.

Acknowledgement

The convening of the two meetings was made possible by support from Sida in the framework of its Drive for Democracy work. The Council would like to thank Malin Ericsson who was the lead contact at Sida when the project was planned and executed.

Notes

1. See the list of participants in the two meetings at the end of this report under annex 1 and annex


2. Scholars at Risk, 2023, ‘Free to Think: Report of the Scholars at Risk Academic Freedom Monitor- ing Project’. Available at https://scholarsatrisk.org/resourc-es/free-to-think-2023/#section1 (accessed 5 July 2024).


3. Wachira Kigotho, 2024, ‘How African universities in Africa lost their academic freedom’, World University News, 22 February 2024, available at https://www.com/post. php?story=2024022115014069 (accessed 10 July 2024).


4. Ana Ganho, 2016, ‘The murder of Gilles Cistac: Mozambique’s future at a crossroads’, Review of African Political Economy, Vol. 43, 147 (March), pp. 142–150, available at https://www.js-tor.org/stable/24858207?seq=1


5. Joe Oloka-Onyango, Revisiting the Struggles for Academic/ Intellectual Freedom  and the Social Responsibility of Intellectuals in Africa: The Case of the Dar es Salaam and Kampala Declarations, Keynote Reflections at the Colloquium on Academic Freedom and Social Responsibility, University of Dar es Salaam, November 7 to 9,


6. UNESCO, 1977, ‘Recommendation concerning the Status of Higher-Education Teaching Personnel (1977), available at https://www.right-to-education. org/sites/right-to-education.org/files/resource-attachments/ILO_UNESCO_Recommendation_Concerning_the_Status_of_pdf (accessed 30 June 2024).


7. Kwadwo Appiagyei-Atua, 2015, ‘Time for an African charter on academic freedom’, Univer- sity World News, 18 July 2015, available at https://www.uni-com/post. php?story=20150717165536327 (accessed 25 June 2024).


8. Adam Alkali, “Concerns rises over sexual harassment on Campuses” African Newspage, 4th May 2021. Available on https://www.africannewspage.net/2016/05/concern-rises-sexual-harassment-campuses/, accessed 16th August 2024.


9. BBC News Africa, 2019, ‘Sex for Grade: Undercover inside Nigerian and Ghanaian universities’. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=we-F0Gi0Lqs


10. Human Rights Watch, 2024, ‘Uganda: Court Upholds Anti-homosexuality Act’, available at https://www.hrw.org/news/2024/04/04/uganda-court-upholds-anti-homosexuality-act#:~:text=The%20Ugandan%20Parliament%20had%20passed,’aggravated%20homosexu a l i t y % 2C ’ %2 0 which%20includes (accessed 15 July 2024).


11. Emmaniuel Wanjala, 2023, ‘Uganda varsity students thank MPs, Museveni for anti-gay law’, The Star, 31 May 2023, available at https://www.the-star.co.ke/news/2023-05-31-uganda-varsity-students-thank-mps-museveni-for-anti-gay-law/ (accessed 14 July 2024).


12. Associated Press, 2021, ‘Video shows desperate Afghans climb- ing US jet to escape’, Associated Press, 17 August 2021, available at https://apnews.com/article/afghanistan-kabul-taliban-79d67 7c29b1e134437842217e469b481 (accessed 5 July 2024).


13. Fanon, , 1967 [1963], The Wretched of the Earth, Harmond- sworth: Penguin.


14. ‘Mīthere Gīthae Mūgo’, available at https://obits.burnsgarfield.com/obituaries/micere-mugo (accessed 10 July 2024).


15. New Vision, 2001, ‘MUK, Mukono students condemn homosexuality’, New Vision, 23 May 2001, available at https://www.co.ug/news/1034116/muk-mukono-students-condemn-homosexuality (accessed 2 July 2024).


16. Kwesi Kwaa Prah, 2006, ‘The African Nation: The state of the nation’, Cape Town: CASAS.


17. Nation, 2015, ‘Zambia prepares for national payer day to save currency’, Nation, 17 October 2015, available at https://nation.africa/kenya/news/africa/zambia-prepares-for-national-prayer-day-to-save-currency-1137306 (accessed 7 July 2024).


18. For a comprehensive review of the literature on unfair knowledge practices especially in health, see Seye Abimbola et al., 2024, ‘Un-fair knowledge practices in global health: a realist synthesis’, Health Policy and Planning, 39, No. 6, pp. 636–650. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/heapol/czae030


19. Oryem Nyeko, 2019, ‘Tanzania drops threat of prison over publishing independent statistics’, Human Rights Watch, 3 July 2019, available at https://www.org/news/2019/07/03/tanzania-drops-threat-prison-over-publishing-independent-statistics (accessed 7 July 2024).


20. Legal and Human Rights Centre, 2017, ‘Tanzania: Human Rights Report 2017’, available at https://www.scribd.com/document/377735286/Tanzania-Human-Rights-Report-2017 (accessed 5 July 2024).


21. Wachira Kigotho, 2024, ‘How universities in Africa lost their academic freedom’, University World News, 22 February 2024, https://www.unicom/post.php?story=2024022115014069


22. Yoliswa Sobuwa, 2021, ‘Universities must do away with deployment of police and security forces on campuses—student union’, Sowetan Live, 3 December 2021, available at https://sowetanlive.co.za/news/south-africa/2021-12-03-universities-must-do-away-with-deployment-of-police-and-security-forces-on-campuses-student-union/ (accessed 8 July 2024).


23. The East African, 2014, ‘Half of graduates in the region are unpre- pared for job market: Study’, The East African, 10 May 2024, available at https://www.theeastafrico.ke/tea/news/east-africa/half-of-graduates-in-the-region-are-unprepared-for-job-market-study--1324654 (accessed 25 June 2024).


24. Since the conference, Makerere University has faced very specific issues relating to academic freedom, which involves a suspicious decision to investigate a lecturer on an exam administered in the Faculty of Law and the suspension of the Dean’s Forum. See, for instance, https://ug/index.php/news/headlines/81408-nawangwe-left-out-in-the-cold-on-law-school-anita-among-exam-probe


25. Sylivester Ernest, 2011, ‘Tanzania: protests at universities, students expelled, World University News, 18 December 2011, available at https://www.com/post.php?story=20111216183615108 (accessed 30 June 2024).


26. Roy Venketsamy, Elaine Baxen and Zijing Hu, ‘Student-teacher violence in South Africa’s Tshwane South District of Gauteng Province: Voices of the victims’, African Journal of Education, Vol. 12, No. 1, pp. 49–69, available at https://www.researchgate.net/publication/371237193_Student-on-teacher_violence_in_South_Africa’s_Tshwane_South_District_of_Gauteng_Province_Voices_of_the_victims (accessed 29 June 2024).


27. Sara Duvisac, 2022, ‘Decolonise! What does it mean?’, Oxfam International, available at https://oxfamilibrary.openre-com/bitstream/handle/10546/621456/rr-decolonize-what-does-it-mean-151222-en.pdf;jsessionid=71D95FDFA0EDE2617E99FAAB94795020?sequence=1 (accessed 7 July 2024).


28. Pillay, (2010) Linking higher education and economic development: Implications for Africa from three successful systems. CHET

 
Annexes: List of Participants for Dar es Salaam and Maputo Convening

Annex 1: List of Participants in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

No NAME ORGANISATION COUNTRY
1. Christine Noe University of Dar es Salaam Tanzania
2. Ng’wanza Kamata University of Dar es Salaam Tanzania
3. Richard Sambaiga University of Dar es Salaam Tanzania
4. Muhidin Shangwe University of Dar es Salaam Tanzania
5. Issa G. Shivji University of Dar es Salaam Tanzania
6. Opportuna Kweka University of Dar es Salaam Tanzania
7. Mona Mwakalinga University of Dar es Salaam Tanzania
8. Hamud Majamba University of Dar es Salaam Tanzania
9. Amstrong Matogwa University of Dar es Salaam Tanzania
10. Sabatho Nyamsenda University of Dar es Salaam Tanzania
11. Boniphace Nelson University of Dar es Salaam Tanzania
12. Chambi Chachage Independent Researcher Tanzania
13. John A. Mahugija University of Dar es salaam Academic, Staff Associa- tion (UDASA) Tanzania
14. Budeba Mlyakado Dar es Salaam University College of Education Tanzania
15. Amos Mwakgonja Muhimbili University of Medicine and Allied Science (MUASA-MUHAS) Tanzania
16. Nizar Visram Independent Researcher
17. Matrona Kabyemela University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania Tanzania
18. Harold Hutouh Mzumbe University Tanzania
19. Gerald Shija University of Dodoma Tanzania
20. Jovine Emmanuel Mkwawa University College of Education, (UDASA- MUCE) Tanzania
21. Hezron Mwakabona Mbeya University of Science and Technology Tanzania
22. Julius Ntwenya ASAPUCT Tanzania
23. Alley Nassoro Zanzibar University Tanzania
24. Hamis Seif Dar es Salaam University Students’ Organization (DARUSO) Tanzania
25. Belinda Zephrine Galeba (Vice President) DARUSO Tanzania
26. Abdul-Azizi Carter University of Dar es Salaam (Student) Tanzania
27. Rogathe Samwel Ombay (President) University of Dar es Salaam (Student) Tanzania
28. Vannesa Rutabana Muhimbili University of Medicine and Allied Science (MUASA-MUHAS) Tanzania
29. Godfrey Daniel Giladu (President) University of Dodoma Students, Association Tanzania
30. Ruth Merik (President) Mkwawa University College of Education_Student Union Tanzania
31. Edwin Ntabinda (President) Mzumbe University – SUDENTS UNION Tanzania
32. Baruani Mshale TWAWEZA Tanzania
33. Tina Mfanga UWAMAMA, Dar es salaam Tanzania
34. Zito Kabwe ACT-Wazalendo Tanzania
35. Kido Jasper Student/Poet Tanzania
36. Anna Henga Legal and Human Rights Centre (LHRC) Tanzania
37. Khalifa Said The CHANZO Tanzania
38. Walter Bgoya Mkuki na Nyota Publishers Tanzania
39. Adebayo Olukoshi Wits University, South Africa Nigeria
40. Willy Mutunga Former President of the Supreme Court of Kenya Kenya
41. Mshai Mwangoa Independent Researcher Kenya
42. Maloba Wekesa University of Nairobi Academic Staff, Union Kenya Kenya
43. Melvine Thongo University of Nairobi Students Council Kenya Kenya
44. Maseruka Granemar Robert Makerere University Uganda
45. Joe Oloka Onyango Makerere University Uganda
46. Noelle Josiane Umuhoza Karemera University of Rwanda Rwanda
47. Dusengimana Sylvie University of Rwanda Rwanda
48. Horicubonye IIdephonse University of Burundi Burundi
49. Habarugila Seleman University of Burundi Burundi
50. Isabel Casimiro CODESRIA President Mozambique
51. Godwin Murunga CODESRIA Executive Secretary Kenya
52. Samwel Fongwa CODESRIA Program Officer Cameroon
53. Bertha Kibona CODESRIA Program Manager Tanzania

Annex 2: List of Participants in Maputo, Mozambique

No. NAME ORGANISATION COUNTRY
1. Godwin Murunga CODESRIA Executive Secretary Kenya
2. Bertha Kibona CODESRIA Program Manager Tanzania
3. Samuel Fongwa CODESRIA Program Officer Cameroon
4. Joe Oloka-Onyango Makerere University Uganda
5. Kamata Ng’wanza University of Dar es Salaam Tanzania
6. Pedro Mzileni University of Zululand South Africa
7. Shokahle Dlamini University of Swaziland Swaziland
8. Simbarashe Gukurume University of Johannesburg Zimbabwe
9. Tiffany Banda University of Malawi Malawi
10. Sibeso Lisulo University of Zambia Zambia
11. Vincent Musilikani University of Zambia Zambia
12. Fred Hendricks Rhodes University South Africa
13. Kwadwo Appiagyei-Atua University of Ghana Ghana
14. Muhidn Juma Shangwe University of Dar es Salaam Tanzania
16. Lyn Adongo Ossome CODESRIA President Kenya
17. Jose Octavio Serra Van-Dunem Pedagogical University Mozambique
18. Carlos Cardoso Center for Social Studies Amílcar Cabral (CESAC) Guinea-Bissau
19. Cesaltina Abreu Catholic University of Angola Angola
20. Arcenio Francisco Cuco University of Rovuma Mozambique
21. Gilson Lazario Agostinho Neto University Angola
22. Maria das Neves Former Prime Minister, Sao Tome Sao Tome
23. Achia Anaiva LEMUSICA Civil society Mozambique
25. Nontethelelo Nkambule Limkokwing University of Creative Tech Eswatini
27. Mlamuli Makhoba University of Zululand South Africa
28. Manuel Guilherme Junior Eduardo Mondlane University Mozambique
29. Elisio Macamo University of Basel Mozambique
30. Ana Nhampule University Joaquim Chissano Mozambique
31. Isabel Casimiro Eduardo Mondlane University Mozambique
32. Teresa Cruz e Silva Eduardo Mondlane University Mozambique
33. Nelson Zavale Eduardo Mondlane University Mozambique
34. Gacinda Mataveia Eduardo Mondlane University Mozambique
35. Crisófia Langa da Câmara Eduardo Mondlane University Mozambique
36. Juvencio Nota Pedagogical University Mozambique
37. Jose Castiano Pedagogical University Mozambique
38. Elisio Jossias Eduardo Mondlane University Mozambique
39. Filimone Meigos Higher Institute of Arts and Culture Mozambique
40. José Macuane Eduardo Mondlane University Mozambique
41. Manuel Macie Eduardo Mondlane University Mozambique
42. Célia Cuna Eduardo Mondlane University Mozambique
43. Severino Ngoenha Technical University of Mozambique Mozambique
44. Chapane Mutiua Eduardo Mondlane University Mozambique
45. Carlos Arnaldo Eduardo Mondlane University Mozambique
46. Carlos Fernandes Eduardo Mondlane University Mozambique
47. Helio Maungue Eduardo Mondlane University Mozambique