The granting of land by Chief Tyali for establishing a place of learning for Africans as early as the 1800s was unprecedented on the sub-continent. During this period South Africa was still in the throes of colonial expansion and British annexation of parts of the Eastern Cape during the Frontier Wars. Chief Tyali’s donation of land to Scottish missionaries came between these Frontier Wars, the primary purpose of which was land dispossession. Given the prevailing circumstances, this would have been unpopular with many African chiefs atthe time. Yet it is precisely this unconventionality that made Chief Tyali a visionary leader. In addition to education, part of the reasoning in granting the land was an attempt to gain knowledge into the workings of the colonial system.
The establishment of Lovedale and later the University of Fort Hare on land granted by Chief Tyali in turn produced some of South Africa's and Africa’s leading stalwarts in the struggle against colonial rule and apartheid. Therefore, the legacy of Chief Tyali and the history of these two institutions and their contribution to South Africa are intertwined. The grave site of Chief Tyali is a tangible representation of the contribution he has made to the education of Africans and great African leaders through his own insightful and visionary leadership.
The University of Fort Hare was South Africa’s first multi-racial, multi-cultural institution, fulfilling Chief Tyali’s desire of educating African people, and became the epitome of ideas, freedom of speech and creative thinking during the oppressive systems of both the colonial and apartheid governments; and from which the very first generation of African leadership and intelligentsia emerged. The sites declared here include the buildings where liberation leaders attended class, meetings, intellectual debates and represents the confluence of ideas from several walks of life that inspired leader who spearheaded the liberation of many African countries.
The University is the custodian of the Liberation Movement Archives (incorporating the African National Congress Archives, Pan African Congress Archives, Black Consciousness Movement archives as well as personal collections, such as Govan Mbeki and Donald Woods)and Africa’s largest collection of contemporary African Art works.
Professor ZK Matthews inspired by the Atlantic Charter, proposed at the ANC’s annual congress the idea of a Congress of the People to draft and adopt a Freedom Charter. With the approval of his proposal, a National Action Council was established with thousands of volunteers collecting inputs from ordinary South Africans across the country. The process of drafting and adopting the Freedom Charter at the Congress of the People in Kliptown in 1955was, at the time, the most democratic in South Africa’s history. The Freedom Charter formed the basis of the liberation movements and the Constitution of the post-apartheid democratic South Africa.
