What does a varsity Chancellor do? Ask Prof Mahmood Mamdani

Uganda’s most celebrated humanities scholar, Professor Mahmood Mamdani, Director of the Makerere Institute of Social Research (MISR), was last week installed as the new Chancellor of the Kampala International University.

He was elevated to the august office at a virtual conferencing investiture ceremony held at the University’s main campus at Kampala’s suburb of Kansanga.

The tech-enabling was necessitated by not only the prevailing Covid-19 conditions but also by Prof Mamdani’s absence from the country.

Present at Kansanga, however, was the Prof’s wife, Mira Nair, the internationally acclaimed film director. Also in attendance was KIU’s retiring Chancellor, Prof John Sebuwufu, who had served in that office for eight years.

A previous Vice-Chancellor at Makerere, Sebuwufu was the one who welcomed me back there when I returned from my 20-year “leave of absence” in Kenya. Then he embarrassed me by telling all our colleagues that he used to sweep my room and shine my shoes when he was my junior at our British-modelled “public” high school.

Back to the ceremony, Mamdani’s assumption of the office of Chancellor at the Kampala International University set me reflecting on two loosely connected matters. One is the role of Chancellors at our universities.

Secondly, I was fascinated by the intricate evolution of higher education in our region over the past few decades, especially with regard to private universities, like the Kampala International University.

Conferring degrees

Traditionally, a University Chancellor is a titular or honorary head of the institution. He does not have to be an academic or even a graduate. Those of my age or near it will remember that in the past, the post of Chancellor at our public universities was reserved for the Head of State. That is how we ended up with Chancellors like Makerere’s Idi Amin in the 1970s.

The most conspicuous role of Chancellors on our campuses is their presiding over our graduation ceremonies conferring degrees and awarding diplomas and certificates.

The day-to-day running of a university falls to the Vice-Chancellor, who is the CEO of the university. The joke goes that the Chancellor reaps all the honours of the university while the Vice-Chancellor bears all its vices.

The name “Chancellor”, however, suggests a wise adviser or counsellor. An active and effective Chancellor should, therefore, generate and offer constructive counsel or advice on how to run his or her university. This presupposes a reasonable awareness and experience of running these institutions of higher running.

This is why many universities today prefer to appoint as their Chancellors people who are not only eminent citizens but also knowledgeable scholars, preferably with university administrative experience, like Profs Mamdani and Sebuwufu, mentioned above.

Changing visions

This is where the role of the Chancellor connects with the changing visions of our tertiary institutions. In the appointment of Prof Mamdani to succeed Prof Sebuwufu, both iconic Makerere figures, as Chancellor of KIU, I see a happy meeting of the private and public sector in tertiary education.

More importantly, I see this event as marking a long term strategy of Kampala International University to take a firm stand in the mainstream of Ugandan and African centres of academic excellence.

“Kenya International University” is one of the affectionate nicknames I have heard for the Kampala International University (KIU). This is mainly because of the apparent predilection of Kenyan students for this major private institution in midtown Kampala. I say “apparent” because I am not sure that KIU’s Kenyan population is any larger than at any other Ugandan university, public or private.

All good Ugandan universities, public or private, are popular with Kenyan students, to the delight of my East African heart. The popularity is, I think, due to two main considerations.

The first is the relative “affordability” of Ugandan tuition and living costs, in comparison to their regional counterparts, which I think is due more to the structure of our economies than absolute figures.

Traditional faith

The second reason is the traditional faith, around our region, in the quality of Ugandan higher education, probably based on the 100-year old Makerere legend. I dare not offer any opinion about this faith, but, as they say, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. At Makerere, I had a standing invitation to participate in the activities of the vibrant Makerere University Kenyan Students Association.

It appears, however, that the Kenyan identity was higher at the KIU than at the other campuses for two main reasons. The first is that the students there were better organised and mutually supportive, or even assertive, thus highlighting their image in the genteel suburb of Kansanga, where their school is located.

 Secondly and more importantly, the Kampala International University was, from its inception in 2001, imaginatively more flexible and accommodating in its admission policies than the rigid traditional public universities and the older private ones modelled on Makerere.

They were thus well-prepared to receive KCSE holders of the Kenyan 8-4-4 system, guiding them through a one-year access course before enrolling them for three-year undergraduate programmes.

All this of course involved epic battles for approval and accreditation in the elevated corridors of the Uganda National Council for Higher Education (UNCHE).

A two-pronged tactic of the strategists at KIU was both to consult closely with the gurus at the older universities and also to hire as many of the best of those dons as were available.

The hiring turned out to be easier than expected, as Makerere and Kyambogo, the traditional public universities, used to retire their academics at the surprisingly early age of sixty.

Anyway, the upshot of this was that KIU is no longer a poor cousin of the big academic institutions but their close ally, respectably ranked in their fraternity.

According to my friend, Dr Ambrose Kibuuka, a member of the KIU Board of Trustees and Council, who presided over the investiture ceremony, their immediate intention is to develop into a top-notch research institution, playing on the international stage.

With a Chancellor like Mamdani, KIU looks quite set to “explore the heights”, as their motto says.

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