It is not uncommon to hear of the individualising, sexualising and belittling scrutiny when it comes to women seeking to occupy powerful public positions in South Africa.
It seems that the levels of accountability, media hyper-visibility and scrutiny are reserved for black women who are seemingly disposable and vulnerable to governance crises engulfing many of our institutions. An important question would then be where and how the problems at Unisa, and at other institutions, began. It seems that LenkaBula and those who have subsequently joined Unisa’s council inherited an institution already in deep crises.
What is troubling about LenkaBula’s case is that it seems to form part of a pattern of public scrutiny that seems hyper-focused on the qualifications, competencies and personal attributes of black women leaders in the sector, while ignoring similar or even worse performance by their male counterparts.
The sheer numbers of male leaders and the institutionalised masculine power, along with different standards for male and women leaders occupying these senior positions, has meant that male leaders can lead with little public scrutiny and with the understanding that even if there are problems, they are simply assumed to have the competency to be leaders.
These women are then dealt a debilitating blow as they end up unable to complete their terms of office and become the scapegoats for the inherited dysfunction and malfunctioning of these institutions.