ANC veteran and former Minister of Arts and Culture Pallo Jordan resigned from the party yesterday, following the Sunday Times report exposing his false academic qualifications.
Jordan has gone by the title “doctor” for many years, but did not receive a PhD from either of the academic institutions he studied at overseas; the University of Wisconsin in the United States or the London School of Economics. Additionally, the Sunday Times could find no evidence of Jordan being awarded an honorary doctorate.
Jordan is the editor of Oliver Tambo Remembered: A Collection of Contributions from Around the World Celebrating the Life of OR Tambo, and contributed to London Recruits: The Secret War against Apartheid and Time to Tell.
In light of the expose on 3 August, Jordan disappeared from the public eye, despite a number of prominent South Africans coming out in support of him, including Professor Steven Friedman, TO Molefe and Professor Mary Metcalfe.
ANC Chief Whip in Parliament Stone Sizani defended Jordan in an official statement, calling him a “source of pride” for the party.
“He is one of the movement’s greatest products, a public intellectual par excellence and a consummate historian,” Sizani said in a statement.
“While academic achievements are important, they can never truly define one’s wisdom, intelligence or intellectual depth.”
ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe told the Mail & Guardian yesterday that Jordan has owned up to his deceit in a letter to the ANC’s leadership, providing a “detailed explanation” and offering to “resign his membership of Parliament, the National Executive Committee of the ANC and the ANC”:
“A man of Comrade Pallo Jordan’s intellect does not need to perpetuate deceit, he must be given time to deal with his guilt,” Mantashe said. “As the ANC, we have accepted his public apology. To apologise was not an action of the faint hearted”.
Mantashe cautioned that while Jordan voluntarily took responsibility for the false qualifications, he should not be “destroyed”.
Book details
- Oliver Tambo Remembered: A Collection of Contributions from Around the World Celebrating the Life of OR Tambo edited by Zweledinga Pallo Jordan
EAN: 9781770102361
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- London Recruits: The Secret War against Apartheid edited by Ken Keable
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EAN: 9780850366556
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- Time to Tell by Barry Feinberg and Pallo Jordan
EAN: 9781920222345
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