Krish Govender on SAFm discusses how Ashwin Desai was unbanned years ago : IMC-SA

Vuyo Mbuli: Krish Govender good morning to you.

Krish Govender: Good morning Vuyo . should I just carry on?

VM: Yes .. what's the point you wanted to make?

KG: Well, I received a call from my wife saying that my name was mentioned
on the programme a couple of mintues ago and I tuned in and felt that I may
have missed some of the things that may or may not have been said but I
think I need to make a little bit of a contribution

VM: Yes, were you the attorney general in KZN?

Ashwin Desai: The deputy chair of council.

VM: the deputy chair of council.

KG: Yes I was the deputy chair of the council of the university of
Durban-Westville before the merger with the then University of Natal. I was
the deputy chair for quite a while and during the short stint when Dr Cooper
was vice-chancellor for the year immediately preceding the merger, a lot of
developments had taken place. As may have been mentioned, I certainly wasn't
a fan of Dr Cooper's for the latter half of the year when I differed with
him quite strongly on many many matters relating to governance at the
university, but there were many things too that Dr Cooper had done right,
and one must not take that away from him. And one of the things that I
recall was the fact that he attempted to reconcile a lot of people who were
let's say banned from the campus - there were about three of them - and he
attempted to find a way to assist the whole process of the merger, so that
we would take as much of the people together into the merger so that there
would be less dissent around the complex issues relating to the merger of
the university of KwaZulu...Natal at that time.

VM: And this reconciliation included getting Dr Desai back to the
university?

KG: Most definitely. The problem was that many things could not be formally
dealt with at council meetings. These are meetings at a very high level with
lots of people from around the country and elsewhere that can only come in
as and when it's possible to structure meetings - many other things had to
be done virtually on an ad hoc basis and urgent basis to fast track the
merger which was always under great deal of time constraint.

VM: With reference to this particular matter?

KG: Dr Cooper did discuss this matter this with me, and I'm sure he
discussed it with other senior members on the council, and I was of the view
that this was most urgent, that Dr Desai and others who were previously
banned from the campus be rehabilitated - to use a very crude word - and be
brought back into the academic and intellectual fold, so that they can play
a rightful role in the process of advancing the merger and making the
contribution to the new university and the.

VM: And did you manage to do that as the then council of the university of
Durban-Westville

KG: Unfortunately this didn't get to be tabled, but in the nature of so many
things that happened, only the problem areas were issues that were raised at
council. When people felt something was happening, decisions, were being
taken by management of the then UDW that were enhancing smooth delivery and
actions, these were just taken for granted. I concede that that may have
been an omission if one looks back and thinks how important this issue has
now become. In my view it's a trivial issue. It's about rehabilitating
building and advancing the interests of this province and the merger.

VM: Ok Mr Govender, just perhaps to give other callers an opportunity, We
had this long discussion yesterday with Prof Makgoba, and we've welcomed Dr
Desai, and Prof Bond is also adding wonderful value to our discussion and
the conversation here this morning. Just in terms of a way forward, is there
are a way forward that you've perhaps as a potential route to solving the
problem and laying it to rest once and for all?

KG: Thank you very much Vuyo, I actually wanted to talk about the way
forward. I really think that our province and this country and the
university needs powerful academics, intellectuals who are giants, like Prof
Makgoba and Dr Desai to be part of this vibrant democracy that is twelve
years old. We do not need them to go public to trash each other, to attack
each other, we attack South Africa and all that's good in it. We need to
stop this, we need to say this is a technical issue. We all know today, if
you want something to happen, you can make it happen. If you do not want to
make it happen, you can look for technical reasons and other problems and
delay it.

VM: Dr Desai said he's happy for a mediation, Dr Desai am I quoting you
correctly?

AD: Sure

VM: Would you be happy to mediate Mr Govinder?

KG: I might be seen as someone who is an interested party that did not put
things right for Dr Desai and the merger by not bringing this up in the
council meeting, so some people might say that I might not be the right
person, but I would say that a person of integrity in the provice -there are
many that we have. One person that comes to mind is Bishop Ruben Philip who
I have a great deal of regard for and who I'm sure the whole province
regards very highly, is someone who I can suggest off the top of my head who
could be a person who could facilitate this. I really think this province,
this country needs academics, vibrant intellectuals. Passionate,
compassionate people like even Dr Desai who can be sometimes, I criticise
him for being too strong and too emotional but that's him, and that's the
sort of people we also need in the country to evoke debate and advance
serious discussion in our democracy.

VM. Let's leave it at that, thank you very much Mr Govender.