|
Prof Louis Molamu &
Dr Ishmael Noko
Prof Mandla Makhanya, Dr Ishmael Noko & Prof Barney Pityana
|
Unisa confers an honorary doctorate on Ishmael Noko
On Tuesday 2 June 2009, Unisa conferred an honorary doctorate on Ishmael Noko, the first African General Secretary of the Lutheran World Federation (LWF), a position he has held since 1994.
Dr Noko is the founder and president of the Inter-Faith Action for Peace in Africa (IFAPA), a conflict resolution and peace-building initiative incorporating the continent’s seven faith traditions: African traditional religion, the Baha’i faith, Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam and Judaism.
He was born on 29 October 1943 in Zimbabwe, where he received his primary and high school education. He studied Theology at the Lutheran Theological College at Umpumulo, KwaZulu-Natal. In 1971, he obtained a BA at the University of South Africa. After being ordained in 1972, he studied for and attained a master's degree in Theology at the Lutheran Theological Seminary in Saskatoon, Canada. From 1974 to 1977, Dr Noko studied at McGill University in Quebec and earned a doctoral degree on the topic "The concept of God in Black Theology: an appreciation of God as liberator and reconciler".
He studied and worked overseas for a period of time before returning to Africa. He then accepted a lecturing position at the University of Botswana where he was eventually appointed as Dean of the Faculty of Humanities. He then joined the LWF’s Department of World Services where he provided refugee services to churches, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and the now African Union as well as other organisations.
Dr Noko has received other honorary doctorates from several other institutions of higher learning, including the Lutheran Theological Seminary, Saskatoon, Canada; the Lutheran Theological Seminary, Philadelphia, USA; the Californian Lutheran University, California, USA; and the Gurukul Lutheran Theological College and Research Institute, Chennai, India. |
