Annual lecture endowed

AN Eastern Cape university's business school has been selected by a non-profit trust to host a yearly lecture series.

The Archbishop Thabo Cecil Makgoba Development Trust – a non-profit organisation that focuses on poverty alleviation initiatives – has chosen Rhodes University Business School as the site for the annual lecture on Values-Based Leadership.

The selection comes with an unspecified donation which will be handed over tomorrow by Archbishop Thabo Makgoba to acting university vice-chancellor Dr Sizwe Mabizela.

A university spokesman said the endowment was a once-off contribution towards the event that would be invested and the proceeds used annually to host the lecture and award a prize to a student whose outstanding essay or publication reflected values-based leadership.

The archbishop said: "In honour of our parents who have raised and nurtured us through values, my wife Lungi and I, together with the trustees of the [trust], wish to endow in perpetuity an annual lecture at Rhodes Business School on values-based leadership or decision-making."

Rhodes University Business School director Professor Owen Skae said: "[The school] is proud to have been chosen ... to host an annual lecture on values-based leadership.

"I suppose some may be surprised a business school has been given this honour.

"Rhodes Business School has as its essence 'leadership for sustainability' and we place huge emphasis on responsible leadership and ethics." - Xolisa Phillip