Letters for Lulu delivered to DAC

Letters of concern about heritage and archives in South Africa handed to Arts and Culture Minister

On 8 December 2009, Archival Platform Director Dr Harriet Deacon handed six letters highlighting problems in the South African heritage and archives sector to Acting Deputy Director General of Cultural Heritage, Vusithemba Ndima.

The letters, addressed to Arts and Culture Minister Lulu Xingwana, emphasised issues such as a lack of strategic thinking about the sector, underfunding and understaffing of archives, and an inconsistent approach among officials to applying heritage laws and digitising heritage records.

The letters were submitted by professionals and organisations in the heritage and archives sector as part of the Archival Platform’s “Letters for Lulu” campaign, a constructive engagement with the ministry in the spirit of former Finance Minister Trevor Manuel’s “Tips for Trevor” campaign.

The Archival Platform is a non-profit networking, advocacy and research initiative in South Africa, funded by the Atlantic Philanthropies, which raises issues of professional and public concern around archives and heritage in South Africa.

The Platform’s website, http://www.archivalplatform.org, has had thousands of visitors since its launch on 18 August 2009, and more than 1 000 people voted in its first online poll on the use of cameras in archives.

The Archival Platform’s “Letters for Lulu” campaign has raised concerns about the state of South Africa’s archives.

There is still a window of opportunity in which we can intervene to address the serious problems in the country’s archive sector. By so doing, we can help to improve government monitoring and accountability. We can foster a stronger sense of national identity based not on fantasies of the past, but on more durable realities of the present.

The broad support for the Archival Platform via its website, polls, discussion on its blog and in other ways shows that the professional archive sector is willing to assist in this process, and we await the positive response of the ministry in addressing the crisis.

In its letter, the South African Historical Society comments on the poor physical state of archival buildings, service problems at some archives, undemocratic censorship actions, unnecessarily conservative record digitisation policies and inconsistent policies towards researchers’ use of cameras in archives.

The South African History Archive comments in its letter on problems that hamper government implementation of the Promotion of Access to Information Act, including a severe lack of records management skills, lack of sufficient resources, low staffing levels, and a lack of understanding of the law.

On behalf of the delegates to a 2007 conference that raised some of these issues, the Archival Platform itself has written a letter highlighting this crisis in the South African archive and heritage sector. The 2007 conference pointed out that we need more public investment in archives and heritage: a better understanding of our past can help us to move into the future at a time when social cohesion is teetering dangerously on the brink. We need to improve effectiveness and efficiency of government record keeping and processing to ensure accountability and oversight. We need to ensure that the public has access to government records to address matters of public interest and defend our human rights record. We need a national strategy for training and retention of archivists and heritage practitioners to ensure we have the human resources in place to address these concerns. We need coherent and consistent policies on digitising government archives to promote public access and ensure the preservation of our national estate.

Young professionals in the sector have spoken in their letters about the dearth of funding for individuals in the sector, the need to promote oral history, the importance of digitising collections, and the need for a review of existing policies on copying materials in archives.

The Archival Platform hopes and trusts that Minister Xingwana will read the letters and respond timeously.

For more information, please contact:

Dr Harriet Deacon, Director, Archival Platform (.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address))