Nearly 50 years after abandoning his university studies in South Africa to become one of the leaders of the anti-apartheid struggle, activist Jay Naidoo receives an honorary doctorate from UQAM. “I never finished my studies, because I chose to go to what is called the University of Life”, laughs the man in an interview by videoconference, on the eve of the celebration on Friday. “I feel like I’m 16 again! »
Jay Naidoo was 4 years old when he was confronted with the harsh reality of the racist policies of apartheid in South Africa. “We were evicted from our house because we were the wrong color, on the wrong side of the street,” he says in English. “That, in and of itself, is the politics that comes into your life at a very young age. It made me very angry to have to leave this house and this neighborhood that I loved. »
In 1976, the young medical student met Steve Biko, a “very charismatic” young leader who changed his life. “I think that was the most important event of my own politicization,” says Jay Naidoo. Steve Biko embraced the new black consciousness movement, which gave us dignity. This is what would strengthen our resolve to defeat the apartheid state. »
That year, they took to the streets by the millions, he recalls. “But in 1977 they brutally murdered Steve Biko and many of us had to go into hiding. »
Union resistance
A few years later, in the 1980s, Jay Naidoo took control of South Africa’s largest trade union centre, the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU). “The union became, I think, the backbone of the political struggle in South Africa because the repression had fundamentally destroyed the organizations and the political resistance in the communities. The factories were the only place where the apartheid state could not intervene. They could occupy townships, schools, universities, but they could not enter every factory. »
In 1994, at the request of Nelson Mandela, he joined the cabinet of the very first black president of South Africa as Minister for Reconstruction and Development and then as Minister for Telecommunications and Broadcasting.
“Jay Naidoo then carried out several large-scale projects for social development and the fight against poverty and illiteracy,” summarizes UQAM in the press release announcing the distinction. “Of all its achievements, Earthrise Trust is the one that best reveals its deep humanism. In 2013, he therefore invested all his assets in the purchase of a plot of land from a white farmer to establish a cooperative of black peasants dispossessed by apartheid as well as a daycare center and a school. This initiative is recognized as a model of racial reconciliation in South Africa. »
He was named in 2013 in the list of the 100 most influential Africans by the magazine New African.
“Jay won’t say it, because he is too modest, but during the last decade of the anti-apartheid struggle, Jay was perhaps the most important person inside the country”, underlines Dan O’Meara, professor at the University of Quebec in Montreal. It was he who suggested the candidacy of Jay Naidoo as the recipient of an honorary doctorate. At the time, Dan O’Meara, also from South Africa, was in exile and led the anti-apartheid struggle from Montreal. This is where the two men met in 1987.
When Quebec journalist Lucie Pagé left for South Africa to cover the release of Nelson Mandela, Dan O’Meara suggested she meet Jay Naidoo. In front of their respective screens, the two men laugh while evoking this memory. “I hadn’t thought at the time that there would be a love bond that would develop between the two, I was rather thinking of an intellectual connection! »
System failure
Today, Jay Naidoo and his wife, Lucie Pagé, live on two continents, one foot in the Eastern Townships – where he is trying to learn French – and the other in Johannesburg. They have three children – two in South Africa and one in Quebec – and three grandchildren. Through them, the 68-year-old grandfather rediscovers the magic of childhood, the one he was unable to experience because of the color of his skin. “I call my grandchildren my wisdom keepers,” he said tenderly. They remind me why I get up in the morning, the importance of leaving them a better world. »
Jay Naidoo puts a lot of hope in the next generation, called to change the world. He talks about the climate crisis, the fear of global conflict and nuclear war, authoritarianism, repression, private interests that “determine how our governments act”. It evokes the loss of confidence of young people in institutions and in democracy itself. At the same time, he sees an increase in poverty and injustice on a planetary scale. “All of this represents what I call a perfect storm of system failure.”
In recent writings, Jay Naidoo questions the effectiveness, even the dangerousness of COVID vaccines and even goes so far as to indicate that the censorship by governments and pharmaceutical companies of those who dare to ask questions reminds him of the apartheid era.
“I am not against vaccines, but I make a distinction with the COVID vaccine. I think we should take a break and have a public debate around this issue, he answers in an interview with the Duty. I ask questions, and I believe it’s my basic right, a right I’ve fought for all my life and no one is going to take it away from me. »
However, he prefers to stay, in the context of this interview, on the subject of the day and quickly returns to his attachment to UQAM, the alma mater of his wife and one of his sons. “It becomes a family affair,” he laughs.
He is all the more honored that this recognition comes from a Canadian university, a country which “stood up when the majority of Western countries remained silent or openly supported apartheid”, specifies it, urging the world population to reconnect with this solidarity to help the most vulnerable.
In his acceptance speech, he returned to the urgency of acting, of rethinking governance by giving a path to different cultures and nations, in harmony with nature. “I am part of a generation that was ready to die for our freedom. In this turbulent world where distrust of institutional leaders is at its height, the next generation must ask themselves what they are ready to live for. »