.Professor Fatima Meer Memorial Lecture 2024
The Professor Fatima Meer Memorial Lecture was launched in 2022 at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. Housed in the School of Social Sciences and College of Humanities, it is now fast becoming a central feature of the University’s annual calendar, with several prestigious speakers already having delivered the lecture. Previous lectures have focused on Meer’s legacy as a scholar-activist, as well as her artwork and its contribution to the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa.
The theme for 2024 focuses on Struggles for Freedom from Apartheid: South Africa and Palestine. As Meer’s daughter, Judge Yasmin Shehnaz Meer has noted: ‘The 2024 Fatima Meer Memorial Lecture significantly focuses on Palestine’s heart wrenching struggle for self-determination and the parallels with South Africa.’ This is a very apt description of what the intention of this year’s lecture is, which is to highlight the parallels of the struggle that South Africans went through in fighting and defeating apartheid and the current struggles that the Palestinians are waging against the apartheid system that Israel is imposing on them.
The events that unfolded on October 7, 2023 on the border of the Gaza strip, and what has occurred since then have resulted in what can only be considered as a tectonic shift in global politics. This has opened up an ongoing conversation on what has been happening in Gaza since then and indeed what Palestinians have endured since 1948 at the hands of the Israeli military occupation. The Israeli military attack on Palestinians that has intensified since October 2023 has now effectively become a fully-fledged genocide.
The work done by Professor Fatima Meer during her lifetime recognised and highlighted both the struggles endured by South Africans and Palestinians to achieve freedom and political self-determination. She was herself quite deeply involved in the South African struggle and when apartheid in South Africa was formally dismantled in 1994, she began to advocate even more intensely for the Palestinians to be liberated from the apartheid that continues to be imposed on them by the Israeli regime. Her commitment to this cause was even more clearly evident at the 2001 World Conference Against Racism in Durban, where she - together with other anti-apartheid activists such as the late Dennis Brutus, political activist and poet - led a march of over 20 000 South Africans and conference delegates from around the world to speak out against Israel’s brutality and to lead the chants of “Zionism is racism”.
Given the actions of the South African government in early 2024 to undertake the unprecedented step of bringing the State of Israel before the International Court of Justice, the role that South Africans have played and continue to play in standing with solidarity with their Palestinian counterparts is indisputable. It is a cause that demands deep conviction, fortitude, courage and steadfastness, all qualities that Meer possessed in abundance as she endured incarceration at the hands of the South African apartheid regime and used her abiding belief in human rights for all to continue advocating for the Palestinians after South Africa achieved its formal liberation from apartheid.
While we continue to face various ongoing challenges as South Africans, we are nevertheless blessed to now have the ability to speak out against injustice elsewhere.
The 2024 Professor Fatima Meer Memorial Lecture will be delivered by Professor Paulus Zulu, a well-known academic who had a long-standing collegial friendship with Meer and Mr Na’eem Jeenah who is a globally renowned Palestine Solidarity activist. The third panelist will be Professor Monique Marks who is well known for her social justice work and commitment to advocating for the preservation of Palestinian human rights. The lecture will be held on 31 August 2024 at the Howard College Theatre on the Howard College campus of the University of KwaZulu Natal and will commence at 14h00.
For further enquiries please contact Ms Jennene Naidu.
Dr Lubna Nadvi is an academic and researcher based in the Political Science and International Relations programme in the School of Social Sciences at UKZN. In this role she has published several academic articles and book chapters and held various leadership roles such as Head of Department of Political Science at the former University of Durban Westville and Academic Leader of Teaching and Learning (Acting) in the School of Social Sciences, UKZN. She serves as the current Chair of the Professor Fatima Meer Memorial Lecture committee based at UKZN.
She is also a community activist involved in various local and international solidarity and human rights. She has also served as Deputy Chair and Chair of the human rights organisation, The Advice Desk for the Abused and as an exco member of civil society structures such as The Active Citizen’s Movement.
*The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of the University of KwaZulu-Natal.
Photograph: Supplied