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Legal eagle scoops continental accolade

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The Africa Leadership Awards are all about achievers, super achievers, and future business leaders. The event attracts the best of the best from more than 50 African partner countries, and one of the best of the best this year is Unisa’s own Jan van Wyk, Executive Director of Legal Services.

He won the Education Leadership Award, which was announced at the award ceremony held on 5 December 2018 at Le Méridien, Mauritius. The award is presented to an individual who has crafted leadership with their work and thinking. The award indicates excellence in application of leadership principles to business situations.

Van Wyk spoke to eConnect about his department and his achievements.

What does winning this award mean to you as an individual, your department, and to Unisa as a whole?

It is always good to receive acknowledgement by the international community for accomplishments in one’s professional capacity. It shows that the international educational community keeps its eye on you and your organisation.

If one bears in mind that it is an independent jury that observes one’s (entirely oblivious about it) movements over a period of five years, it means that one’s performance must be consistent and of a very high standard. I work for Unisa and whatever my colleagues and I did was within the course and scope of our employment with the university.

Unisa is a great asset to the country and at the forefront of sailing uncharted waters on many levels. By recognising my humble effort, they equally recognise Unisa as my vessel and the flag under which I have sailed since 2004.

What efforts and strategies do you put into the department and its services that led you to win this international award?

As lawyers of the university, we are aware that even though we have line-managers, we are employed at a public university that operates on taxpayer’s money. Our responsibility is towards an office or a body established by the creating Act. We are thus obliged to act in the interest of the university. Most, if not all actions and/or failure to act by a university must be and is subject to the constitution of the country and can at any stage be subject to an administrative review by the courts of the country.

Unisa is a great asset to the country and at the forefront of sailing uncharted waters on many levels. By recognising my humble effort, they equally recognise Unisa as my vessel and the flag under which I have sailed since 2004.

What is on your departmental agenda for 2019?

Our new strategy is to become more pro-active and visible, and provide more training and early introduction of the Legal Services Office to new higher-level appointees.

Inspired by the university’s efforts to be the African university in the service of humanity, the department recently introduced itself and its facilities to the Legal Division of the Association of African Universities at a workshop in Botswana.

Please tell us more about your legal background.

I completed my law degrees at the University of Stellenbosch and started my career as a public prosecutor at what was then known as the Attorney General, and is now known as the National Prosecuting Authority, in Durban 1981. I later requested a transfer as a state attorney, doing both civil and criminal cases where the state is sued or where the state institutes civil action.

I did my articles in Johannesburg and was later transferred with promotion to the Bloemfontein Office of the State Attorney as a senior state attorney. While in Bloemfontein, I studied for a Master’s in Criminal Law, which I passed with distinction.

Around 1988, I established my own practice in the Eastern Free State and in 1995, I decided to join academia as a senior lecturer.

In 1997, when the Higher Education Act was established, the then management of the university requested me to establish and manage the Unisa legal office.

*Interview by Tshimangadzo Mphaphuli

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Publish date: 2018-12-12 00:00:00.0

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