Mr Jabu Mbalula, MEC for Community Safety, Roads, and Transport, Free State;
Prof Alfred Ngowi, Deputy Vice-Chancellor: Research, Innovation and Engagement;
Councillor, Gregory Nthatisi, Executive Mayor: Mangaung Metro;
Prof Fulufhelo Nelwamonda, CEO of the NRF;
Prof Muthoni Masinde, Dean of the Faculty of Engineering;
Prof Yali Woyesa, Assistant Dean: Research, Innovation and Engagement;
Dr Gerrie Booysen, Director: Centre for Rapid Prototyping and Manufacturing;
Dr Mamoeletsi Mosia, Managing Director of SAASTA;
Ms Hlompo Malehodi, Mechatronics Apprentice;
Representatives of Universities and TVET Colleges;
The teachers;
The learners;
Exhibitors;
I am delighted to be here with you today. Just yesterday, I was in the Northern Cape, at a place called Carnarvon. Carnarvon as you know is the host of what is going to be world’s largest array of telescopes, the Square Kilometre Array.
In Carnarvon, I was talking to learners like yourselves, about science, especially astronomy. I was telling them about the benefits of astronomy.
This was part of the celebrations of World Tourism Day and the launch of an important initiative- our country’s first Astro-Tourism Strategy, which I want to talk about briefly.
Through this Astro-Tourism Strategy, we seek to demonstrate and derive benefit from the connection between science and tourism. As you can tell, Astro-Tourism is related to astronomy.
Astro-Tourism enables people to interact with and experience observatories, telescopes, museums, planetariums, meteorite sites, visitor centres, amateur astronomy clubs, stargazing, tour-guides, Astro-routes, and accommodation establishments, etc.
We normally have tourists come to South Africa to see the big five or our beaches. We now also want them to enjoy our unique access to observation of the stars.
What does our country’s first Astro-Tourism Strategy have to do with today’s event? It has everything to do with todays’ event. As we did yesterday in Carnarvon, we are here today to excite our young people about the wonderful world of science.
We usually host our National Science Week at the beginning of August of every year. However, we had to wait until the elections were over because we wanted to make sure the new Administration is firmly established so that when we do have our Science Week, the whole country’s attention can be on it.
The theme for the 2024 National Science Week is, "Living in a high-tech world: should we be concerned?” Through this theme, we seek to among others, encourage of a culture of critical conversations among ordinary people and especially our youth, about the value of science to society.
For example, we see every day on the news how the state of Israel uses drones to launch missiles to injure and kill men, women, and children in Palestine and Lebanon.
The same drones could have been easily used to save the lives of Palestinian and Lebanese men, women, and children, by facilitating the delivery of important medical supplies to them.
This obviously raises fundamental questions about the use of science and technology by human beings. The use of science and technology to cause bring human to human beings or to destroy the environment, are some of the reasons why we thought we must select this particular theme for the 2024 National Science Week.
The 2024 National Science Week will run until the 5th of October, for a week. This week-long celebration provides all stakeholders with the opportunity to advance the goals of our science engagement programme, by generating the necessary buzz about science in everyday life.
The hosting of National Science Week 2024 fulfils the implementation of our Department’s Science Engagement programme, which draws from our 1996 White Paper on Science and Technology.
This White Paper required government to initiate a national programme to build a science-literate, science-aware, and independently opinionated society in South Africa.
It is important to remember that it was the first democratic Government under President Mandela, which made the decision to make science accessible for all and the establishment of a stand-alone Department for science to receive priority attention in government and in our country.
There are a number of reasons why this is important. One of those reasons is our history of racial exclusion and oppression. Even though you were not born yet, you must have heard of something called apartheid.
One of the intentions of apartheid was to ensure that Black people get an inferior education so as to prepare them to become what one of the principal architects of apartheid referred to as “hewers of wood and drawers of water.”
One of the ways in which the apartheid state intended to achieve this was by instilling the believe in the minds of Black people that they do not have the intellectual ability do science or mathematics.
The apartheid state therefore used the law to ensure that, both at school and university, Black people were channelled towards subjects or courses that will only equip them to be servants of other people, and not have the skills to engage in science or productive economic activity.
I must however also make the point that, in spite of this history, over the past 30 years we have made commendable progress in increasing the numbers of black and women scientists. There is of course still a lot of work to be done in this regard, but we cannot deny the progress that has been made over the past 30 years.
With this history in mind, today I am particularly excited to announce that, one of the highlights of this year’s National Science Week is a young person like you- Mr Munei Netsharotha.
Munei is an incredibly special young man. He is a Grade 12 learner at Tshivhase Secondary School in the Vhembe District Municipality in Limpopo. He constructed a hydrogen fuelled vehicle. Young as he is, his invention aligns perfectly with one of our Departmental priorities-the hydrogen economy.
Upon learning of his invention, I requested my office to make sure that we find Munei and bring him to the 2024 National Science Week, as my special guest.
Today he is here with us, accompanied by his science teacher, Mr Clement Tshivhase and Mr Ntshavheni Demane, who is an SGB member at his school.
Munei will show off his car as part of the exhibitions and I wish to encourage each of you to visit his exhibition and of course the others. The story of Munei is what National Science Week is about.
Also, in our amidst is a young man by the name of Dr Maleke Maleke. Dr Maleke is one of the beneficiaries of our long standing partnership with European Union.
Through a programme called ERAMIN, Dr Maleke received funding and went on to complete his Doctoral and Post Doctoral studies. He did this while finishing the work on the project they were working on, which was funded by the Department of Science and Innovation to the tune of R3, 5 million ( 3 500 000).
He did not end there; he went on to use his contacts in the project to move from being a student to being the representative to the Principal Investigator. This resulted in a new project for CUT with international partners.
By all accounts this is a remarkable achievement for a young scientist like Dr Maleke. He who contributed to the advancement of Metal Microbe Interactions as now a Co-Principal Investigator
His role represented a significant shift in his academic career and also enabled him to contribute to the academic development of Masters and Doctoral students at CUT.
Ladies and gentlemen join me in congratulating Dr Maleke in his remarkable journey. Through initiatives such as National Science Week, my Department wants to reach out to that young girl or boy, from the most remote part of our country and make it possible for them reach to same level of Dr Maleke, and even higher.
My message to all the learners who are here today is that: you were born into a democratic order, for which your grandparents fought. Unlike your grandparents, you have available to you a number of opportunities to develop yourselves.
I am not saying you have everything, but you have access to opportunities that were denied to your grandparents. I therefore wish to urge you not to take these opportunities for granted. Use these opportunities wisely and make yourselves and your families proud.
Most importantly, we expect you to take up the various careers in science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and innovation so that we are not only able to produce the critical skills we need to deal with such things as poverty, inequality, pandemics, and the impact of climate change.
But also, we need you take to up careers in science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and innovation so that you become that generation that will help us to kill the fear for maths and science that still exists among Black people and especially our young people.
The other reason we need you take up STEMI careers is so that you are able to help us implement our country’s Science, Technology, and Innovation (STI) Decadal Plan (2022-2032).
This Plan emphasises strategic investments in key areas such as agriculture, manufacturing, mining, health, energy, and the digital and circular economies. We will new types of skills to achieve the objectives of the Decadal plan and this is why it is important for you to study science.
In conclusion, I want to thank the Vice Chancellor of this University, Professor Pamella Dube, and the rest of her management team, for enabling us to host the 2024 National Science Week. My gratitude also goes to the Premier of the Free State, the provincial government, and local municipalities their continued support.
The 2024 edition of National Science Week was also made possible by SAASTA, which is an agency of our entity, the NRF. We are also grateful for the contribution of the science presenters and exhibitors. Ladies and gentlemen, it is now my pleasure to declare the 2024 National Science Week officially open.
