GRADUATION SPEECH, McMASTER UNIVERSITY
HAMILTON, ONTARIO 14 JUNE 2012
TREVOR MANUEL
Chancellor Wilson
President & Vice Chancellor, Patrick Deane
Members of Faculty
Fellow Graduands
Ladies and Gentlemen
Let me start by thanking the McMaster University – firstly for the honour
of the award. And secondly, for the privilege of being able to address
such a distinguished group as “fellow graduands”.
It was particularly challenging figuring out what to talk to you about
today. It was challenging because our experiences are light years apart.
We are separated by geography: Hamilton and Johannesburg are 13 500
km away from each other; Canada hugs the North Pole, South Africa is a
ship-ride away from the South Pole. We are also separated by
experience: You have just been through some of the best formal
education in the world; my schooling took a more unconventional route:
it included learning, through activism and mobilisation, in South Africa’s
poorest neighbourhoods; through various stints in prison – for beliefs,
that is, and not crime; being tutored by some of Africa’s greatest leaders,
including my mentor Nelson Mandela; and by being plunged into roles
with responsibilities many thought I was ill-equipped to do. In many
cases they were probably right! But each one of the jobs steeled me and
taught me invaluable lessons – about life, about failure and success,
about determination, including the determination to prove naysayers
wrong; about fighting for justice and that it isn’t a one-step, onemoment process. And that it is indeed possible to change the course of
1
history if you believe in something strongly enough and are prepared to
fight for it and to join others in common cause.
And lastly we are separated by age: that, I think is obvious and doesn’t
need any further explanation! Suffice to say you have the bulk of your
lives ahead of you, and I have the bulk of mine behind me.
But I haven’t come all this way to sound fatalistic. I’ve come to talk to
you about opportunity. What I’m hoping to do today is to show that
although we are separated by geographies and experiences, we still
share a common destiny. We need to agree that this common destiny
requires us to find one another in a common endeavor. And that the
common endeavour is to grasp the opportunity that the current global
crisis offers and remake the world. For the better.
I really do believe that we are on the cusp of great change: the second
decade of the 21st Century has opened up possibilities for a
transformation of the global order that have not existed in my life time.
The choice is ours: or, more to the point, yours - because this century
belongs to you.
You might well wonder where my optimism comes from. The headlines
about markets collapsing and economies imploding hardly inspire hope.
My sense that we’re on the edge of something great stems from
reactions to these disastrous events – in rich countries as well as poor.
Across the world there is a uniting demand for significant change. At the
heart of this cry for change is dissatisfaction with inequality and
fundamental inequity. This can be seen in countries hit by the banking
crises where the poor sense that they are worst affected while the
bankers get bailed out; or across the Arabian belt were young people
have risen against state high-handedness, or where students are
demanding access to affordable education. All attest to the fact that
there is a revolt, small and incipient for now, but nevertheless a revolt
against the current order. At the heart of all these protests is an intense
anger at the way the world is ordered, at the inequity of the current
state of affairs. And that it needs to change.
2
When I speak, I speak as a Cabinet Minister: in fulfilling this role I have
become deeply concerned about the chasm that exists between the
Cabinet rooms and the people, the governors and the governed – not
just in my country, but everywhere. But being a minister has also
imbued me with a tremendous sense of optimism about the prospect of
better democracy - not just in South Africa, but everywhere in the world.
There is a flip side to my optimism. I also harbour deep fears that we live
in an age that carries extreme risk – the risk that we will, as a community
of nations, slide backwards. The rise of the right and reactionary forces is
evident in many places in the world. Their agenda is not growth and
prosperity for all, but more wealth for the rich at the expense of social
solidarity. These signs shouldn’t be ignored. They shouldn’t be ignored
because the gains we have made are precious, and in many countries
such as my own, hard won.
Canada offers an example of a rich legacy of progressive thinking and
the entrenchment of human rights. Those of you who are Canadians
were born into a society that has many of the attributes that scores of
nations across the world still aspire to. In 1960 Canada adopted a Bill of
Rights, one of the first of its generation. It opened the door for new
thinking about relationships between people and between peoples and
their governments. It echoes in the great constitutions that have been
written and adopted over the past 50 years.
The principles enshrined in your Bill of Rights have endured many
changes in the fortunes of political parties. Some of have put all the
values of the constitution at the centre of their policies, some have
emphasised one aspect over another, some have elected to take the
narrowest interpretation. Yet, the core values remain embedded in the
political consciousness of the Canadian people.
The Canadian Bill of Rights of 1960 states that Canadians should live
without discrimination by reason of race, national origin, colour, religion
or sex. It enshrines human rights and fundamental freedoms such as:
(a) The right of the
individual to equality before the law, and
3
(b) the freedoms of
religion, speech, assembly and the press;
This might sound like motherhood and apple pie. But for hundreds of
millions across the world these basic rights remain a chimera. They
cannot speak their minds; they cannot associate freely, their
newspapers are banned and their journalists are murdered.
Much of this was true in South Africa too until 18 years ago. I am part of
a generation that struggled for democracy and drafted a Constitution so
that successive generations could enjoy, as you have, the right to dignity
and freedom.
Our Constitution echoes yours in many crucial respects: it establishes
South Africa as a sovereign, democratic state founded on the following
values:
(a) Human dignity, the achievement of equality and the advancement of
human rights and freedoms.
(b) Non-racialism and non-sexism and
(c) Supremacy of the constitution and the rule of law
We are separated by history, but bound together in these values.
Canadians now live many of the rights and freedoms set out in their
constitution. You live in a modern, growing and relatively equal country.
Canada has one of the lowest gini coefficients in the developed world.
Your social services, even for the poor are of excellent quality. These
elements of social solidarity have not been at the expense of growth.
No; they contribute towards growth and prosperity for everyone.
We haven’t arrived there yet, still hamstrung by the legacy of a terrible
history. The process of democratization has proved tougher than we
could have imagined. We have made great strides in entrenching
political rights, but we have made painfully slow progress in extending
and embedding socio-economic rights. We have one of the highest
levels of inequality in the world; there are still South Africans who don’t
have access to quality education, or a decent roof over their heads or
4
clean water.
South Africa is not alone in facing these challenges. There are many of
who in this hall today who come from countries that face the same
difficulties. And what the recent economic crisis has shown is that
problems considered to be the preserve of developing countries are
showing themselves in developed countries too. The last decade has
taught us that we cannot take anything for granted. The stresses caused
by the financial crash have set back countries that seemed invincible.
Poverty is on the increase and inequality is rising at a dramatic pace.
Even Canada, for so long that benchmark of entrenched rights and
freedoms, a nation that has achieved so much by way of equality, is now
trending towards greater inequality.
I point this out not to be gloomy, but because I am convinced that recent
events have shown that we are bound together, you and I. We are
bound in a struggle for a fairer world. And, if we want to commit to such
fairness, we have to identify what it is we must seek to change.
Our responsibility is to develop a heightened consciousness of what is
happening in the world and to commit together to improving its state.
This is the moment you have. This is an opportunity we share. Let us
commit to making the world a much better place. The only issue is: how
can we make the world a fairer place; how do we make a world where
care and solidarity are the measures of what defines us?
We need a world whose development path will be more sustainable, so
we need people who are aware that they have a responsibility to those
who come after them by not devouring everything in just one
generation. And we need a world that recognizes that all its citizens are
bound together. This is the pledge we owe one another – in spite of
what separates us. I believe we are connected by this historic mission.
One of the distinct privileges I have had was to be plucked from relative
obscurity by Nelson Mandela. He appointed me first as his Minister of
Trade and Industry, and within two years as Finance Minister. He trusted
5
me, and allowed himself to be advised by me – someone almost 40
years his junior. That trust had a profound impact on me and I have tried
to emulate it by placing my trust in those around me willing to
demonstrate their commitment to success.
As you step out of here I hope that you also find great men and women
committed to justice and a new world order who are prepared to put
their trust in you. If they do, I invite you to respond and, in turn, to
extend your trust to others and, together, rise to the challenge of our
time .
You can rise to this challenge where ever you may chose to work –
whether it’s in government, for an advocacy group or in the private
sector. It doesn’t really matter. In my 4-plus decades as an activist for
justice and a fairer world I have manned barricades and I have served as
a government minister. Success was never guaranteed in any of these
roles: but we succeeded because we were bound by a common vision.
We need similarly to build a common vision for the world we want to
see. That’s the challenge. And I invite you to pursue it in the most
effective way possible.
Many of you now leave the campus of McMaster to set out in life,
equipped with what you’ve learnt here. You are unlikely to even
remember my name. You might, at some future point recall that there
was an old geezer who spoke at your graduation who said he was an
African, even though he didn’t much look like one. I don’t expect you to
remember most of what I said. But I do ask that you be champions for
fairness and the future. The champions bit is less important than that
you live as people who believe that the world needs to be, and can be, a
much better place for all of us. I believe it is possible. On a smaller scale I
have seen an unlikely dream come true. I am confident it can be true for
you too.
6