Cape Town – A tech prize targeted at boosting diversity in the South African ICT industry has been criticised by Fin24 users for being 'racist'.
Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (NMMU) and non-profit Happimo NPC are sponsoring a R100 000 award which is available to Masters and PhD graduates from the Department of Computing Sciences and the School of ICT at the university.
READ: Tech prize 'to beat white, male bias'
“One of the deciding factors in choosing NMMU is that it has the most diverse postgrad student programme in South Africa. The future of technology entrepreneurship in Africa can’t be white and male. We need more black and female tech entrepreneurs. I believe NMMU can produce them,” said Alan Knott-Craig Jnr, Happimo NPC founder.
But some Fin24 users disagree.
“If this isn't racist, then nothing is,” said Fin24 user Louwrens.
For Willem, prizes that promote race as a criteria drive South African talent overseas.
“I think everybody should start calling these statements resist, as it just milks our country of it real potential with the brightest young brains leaving the country to where they are really progressing. Do we really want South Africa to become a tribal economy?”
The issue of diversity has emerged as a global trend in tech companies.
Just 2% of Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter employees are black, and women make up 30% of Google employees, but that includes jobs in non tech positions where women make up nearly half (48%) of employees.
Fin24 user Ingrid said that it’s time South Africans moved away from obsessing over race.
“Race should be irrelevant. South Africans are totally obsessed with race. To outsiders, the locals here behave like they are stuck in kindergarten. The world is accelerating away from a quota obsessed South Africa.
“You present no competition to the rest of the world. You actually need to stop obsessing about skin colour and start worrying about really being tech savvy by world standards and really saving the economy,” she added.
NMMU responds
Meanwhile, Professor Jean Gryling, head of Computing Sciences at NMMU, said that merit was a key component in deciding on the award.
“I have worked closely with Alan (Knott-Craig Jnr) over the past five years and appreciate his passion for the country and his thoughts the fact that Africa’s ICT solutions must come from a diverse group of participants. He is clear that successful applicants for this fellowship will purely be chosen on merit and with no other criteria,” he told Fin24.
“Combining these two emphases therefore makes it important to collaborate with a university with the potential of producing a diverse pool of applicants,” Gryling added.