Staff reporter
THE University of Cape Town (UCT) has announced that Professor Mosa Moshabela has accepted an offer to become the university’s 11th vice-chancellor.
This concludes a thorough and consultative six-month recruitment and selection process and Professor Moshabela will formally take up the UCT vice-chancellor position on 1 October 2024.
UCT Chair of Council Norman Arendse (SC) said: “Throughout the recruitment and selection process, he demonstrated deep knowledge and an appreciation of the challenges the UCT vice-chancellor may encounter. He showed a sincere commitment to agile, transformative, and values-based leadership.
“The selection committee believes that Professor Moshabela is the best candidate for such a time as this in UCT’s history and will work with conviction and vision to ensure UCT’s sustainability into and beyond 2030.”
Professor Moshabela has been the deputy vice-chancellor for research and innovation at the University of KwaZulu-Natal since 2021.
An esteemed academic and clinician scientist, he is a member of the Academy of Science of South Africa. He has a decorated career and multiple awards. Among these, the Public Health Association of South Africa awarded him the PHILA Annual Award in 2022 for his contribution to Public Health in South Africa and a Ministerial Special COVID-19 Award in 2020–2021 for COVID-19 Science Communication and Public Engagement.
Professor Moshabela is the Chairperson of the Governing Board at the National Research Foundation and Health Commissioner to the Premier of KwaZulu-Natal, one of the seven multi-sector commissioners on the premier’s Provincial Planning Commission.
He is a former member of the South African Medical Research Council board and former chairperson of the Standing Committee on Health in the Academy of Science of South Africa.
A medical doctor by profession, his research is focused on the implementation science of health innovations. This multidisciplinary practice seeks to improve healthcare access, quality, equity, and impact, especially in resource-constrained sub-Saharan African countries.
Professor Moshabela’s contribution to health research has primarily been improving access and quality in healthcare to combat infectious diseases, particularly HIV and TB, and in the areas of health systems, services, and policy research.
Globally, he is a member of the international advisory board for the Lancet Healthy Longevity, the Lancet commission on synergies between Health Promotion, Universal Healthcare Access, and Global Health Security, and the commission of the US National Academies for Science, Engineering, and Medicine on the Global Roadmap to Healthy Longevity.
Arendse concluded: “We are excitedly looking forward to having Professor Moshabela join UCT, and we have no doubt that he will be an excellent appointment to take the university a notch higher.”
Professor Moshabela will take over from Emeritus Professor Daya Reddy, who has been serving as vice-chancellor on an interim basis since March 2023. Professor Reddy has committed to working with Professor Moshabela over three months to hand over the vice-chancellor baton.
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