Cape Town - Pioneering for change, Professor Gerwel's leadership as previous Rector and Vice-Chancellor was a defining moment for the university when he led a dynamic team of leaders who refused to utilise the university as an instrument of apartheid and proclaimed that the institution should operate as "an intellectual home of the left."
UWC spokesperson Gasant Abarder said that renaming the most iconic building at the university to the most influential person or former leader was fitting given the late professor’s revolutionary and courageous leadership.
"Many universities name important buildings after their most influential people or former leaders. The late Professor Jakes Gerwel certainly fits into this category, and it is most significant because the Main Hall is probably the most iconic building at the University. It is where Professor Gerwel conferred the late President Nelson Mandela’s first honorary doctorate in 1990 after he was released from prison. It is also the first space first-year students engage with during orientation and the last venue they will be seated in before they leave as alumni after graduating.
"Professor Gerwel’s leadership as the former Rector and Vice-Chancellor was a seminal time for the University of the Western Cape. He not only led a dynamic team of leaders who refused to allow the university to be used as an instrument of apartheid but declared that the institution would be the intellectual home for a government-in-waiting even ahead of President Mandela’s election as our first democratic president. It is an open secret that Professor Gerwel was a close friend and confidant of President Mandela, and he left the University to become Director General in the Presidency during President Mandela’s term in office," said Abarder.
In response to the announcement, the CEO of The Jakes Gerwel Foundation, Theo Kemp, said that The Jakes Gerwel Foundation was extremely appreciative of the significant decision to rename its Main Hall because it affirms both Gerwel's rich legacy and his contribution to changing the political climate at the university.
"The Jakes Gerwel Foundation is deeply grateful to Professor Tyrone Pretorius and all involved at the University of the Western Cape for the significant decision to rename its Main Hall to Jakes Gerwel, especially in the year we commemorate the tenth anniversary of Professor Gerwel’s untimely death in 2012.
"This gesture of the UWC is not only a reaffirmation of Jakes Gerwel’s contribution to the transformation of the university in such a turbulent period of the South African political landscape but also of the rich legacy he left us as a nation. This name change clearly signals that we should never forget this intellectual giant, and more importantly, what he stood for. Even in these times with so many challenges in our country, we should not give up hope for the land of equality Gerwel and others fought for, and we all deserve," said Kemp.
Speaking on what he hopes this will teach the students, Abarder added that he hoped students would remember that without Professor Gerwel’s revolutionary and courageous leadership, the university would not have become the leading learning and teaching, research-led institution it is today.
"The name Jakes Gerwel Hall is true to our motto – Respice, Prospice. Loosely translated from Latin, it means that in order to move forward, you have to reflect on what has gone before.
"Our students will know that without Professor Gerwel’s revolutionary and courageous leadership, our university would not have become the leading learning and teaching, research-led institution it is today. The university is still grounded, thanks to Professor Gerwel’s influence, on the three pillars of Social Justice, Community Engagement, and Graduate Employability," said Abarder.
The renaming ceremony will take place on Thursday, 21 July 2022, at 6.15pm.