They call him Moses, Father Christmas, Manjafika, but actually this impressive man with the snow-white hair is a rock, which as a matter of fact is also what his name means in Sesotho. Prof Fika Janse van Rensburg shares some of his highlights, anecdotes, challenges and special moments from his term as deputy vice-chancellor on the campus in Potchefstroom.

Lovers’ Lane lives up to its name
“I will never forget the unexpected show of affection in Lovers’ Lane during the academic procession at my last PhD ceremony on 19 October! I was also touched by the warmth from the many colleagues and students who called out greetings and expressed their caring with their eyes and body language.

“I could not control my tears of astonishment and appreciation.”

Jogging in their birthday suits
In sharp contrast to this experience was the incident one evening when he crossed the bridge in Meyer Street alone and was confronted by a number of men in their birthday suits jogging towards him.

“When I made eye contact with them in the half light, the whole troop made an about-turn and disappeared under the bridge. I kept myself deaf and blind and carried on homewards.”

Colleague, I shrank your office!
He also recalled the trick that he and some colleagues played on a fellow employee by letting him believe that his “already smallish” office had to be divided in two to solve the space problem on campus.

Armed with the amended ground plans and an “official” letter, they informed him that he would have to evacuate his office that Friday, as the work team was going to make the changes over the weekend.

“The colleague fell for this prank and with a seething ‘now the university has gone too far’ he went to protest to the highest authority. Our explanation fell on deaf ears, and after that we had to lie low and tread lightly for a few weeks.”

Expanding ‘our place’
On a more serious note he speaks about the challenges and successes around restructuring the university as a unitary institution without adversely affecting the core business.

“When it came to the NWU’s student life, we succeeded in expanding the ‘our’ in ‘our place’ so that students from very different cultures could feel at home.

A highlight he recalls was that the campus in Potchefstroom was the only one that did not lose a single hour of class time during the disruptions of 2016. “The cherry on top was winning the 2016 Varsity Cup in rugby, netball and hockey.”

More highlights
Another highlight was that the NWU stayed committed to additive multilingualism.

“After a year of research and consultation processes, the Senate decided at its recent meeting to recommend the language policy to the Board for approval at its meeting on 22 November.”

He will always remember the protest march when rubbish bins were knocked over. White and black students watching the demonstration peacefully picked up the scattered rubbish and straightened the bins. They did this over and over again until the protesters gave up and dispersed.

Next year Prof Fika will return to his "first love", namely research about the understanding of the Greek New Testament and its implementation in the lives of South Africans today. He hopes to publish scientific as well as popular scientific articles on this topic.

A young Prof Fika Janse van Rensburg when he was president of the Student Council of the former Potchefstroom University for Christian Higher Education from 1973 to 1974.