The University of Cape Town (UCT) has invited Zambian academic and prominent political commentator Dr Sishuwa Sishuwa as a keynote speaker for its Distinguished Speakers Programme (DSP) on the topic “Africa Day in the Age of Xenophobia: Another Perspective”.

South Africa recently witnessed attacks against foreign nationals, mainly from neighbouring African countries. As part of its Africa Week celebrations, UCT has organised a forum for the discussion of the subject.

The DSP is one of UCT’s premier speaker events and has previously hosted prominent and influential individuals such as South Africa’s former Minister of Finance Trevor Manuel. It is designed to host outstanding speakers who have exceptional stories, perspectives and experiences to share and serves as an important platform for the robust engagement and discussion of relevant issues and topics.

Africa’s top ranked university has this time invited Dr Sishuwa, one of Zambia’s leading public intellectuals, to be the keynote speaker at the event, slated for May 22, 2019, to be hosted by UCT’s Graduate School of Business.

Dr Sishuwa is a lecturer in political history at the University of Zambia. He is also widely regarded for his regular analysis of the contemporary political events in Zambia. His critical political commentaries have frequently placed him at loggerheads with Zambia’s successive governments and leading opposition figures. A graduate of the University of Zambia, Dr Sishuwa completed his master’s and doctoral studies at the University of Oxford, where he read history and politics as a Rhodes Scholar, before returning home to take up a teaching appointment at UNZA in 2015.

His research interests focus on the study of history, identity politics, elections, political parties, civil society and democratisation in Zambia. Dr Sishuwa is currently completing a political biography of Michael Sata that examines the importance of individual leaders in broader processes of political change.