DEFEATING GOLIATH: THE STORY OF A UJ MANDELA RHODES SCHOLAR
NAMED AMONG 2016 AFRICA’S 100 BRIGHTEST YOUNG MINDS
Early Life and Education
Simon Batamya Aseno was born to a poor family by global standards, or a middle income
family by traditional definition, in Zebilla which is situated in the second poorest
administrative regions of Ghana – the Upper East region. Simon, like many of his peers in
the mid 80’s started his education under a mango tree which was opened by a Japanese. He
recalls, “We didn’t have books or slates to write on. There were no chairs under the tree and
the class shifted according to the shadow cast by the sun. We sat on the soil and each pupil
smoothened the sand in front of him and that was your writing pad!”
Simon was doing well in school. He qualified to enter primary school but he failed the
ultimate test. He describes his first defeat, “the academic year began in September and so it
was one September morning and I remember being in the queue after passing the ABCD to
Z and 1, 2, 3, to 10 tests. The criterion for entry into primary one (P 1) – known here in South
Africa as grade one – was rather a military and not an academic one. You were required to
maintain an upright neck and head while facing forward and stretch your right hand over
your head and touch your left ear. If you failed to touch the scaphoid fossa of your ear, you
were out. Sometimes, if you tried and touched the helix, you could be considered. I failed
about twice if my memory serves me right.” When he made it eventually to primary school,
corporal punishment made him a truant. “It was an era that teachers trumpeted the so-called
popular Bible verse ‘spare the rod and spoil the child.’ I loved to be in school but the cane
was my enemy. The teacher on duty determined my presence or absence from school. If
forced, I would leave the house and go follow cattle and dirty myself. When school closed, I
would join the school contingent and arrive home with them.” This was discovered and so he
was taken by his uncle to a then-day city called Yendi according to his definition where he
was enrolled in an Islamic school – Balugu Primary School. He regained his academic
stamina and later returned to his parents much more determined to defy the cane. He
endured but some of his colleagues dropped out. He topped the science paper in his grade
six external examination and qualified to enter the Zebilla Junior High School. In Junior High
School, he became the deputy school prefect but he says that was not the most important
post he held. “The most important post I held in Junior High School and perhaps, throughout
my leadership career was the post of a bell boy.” Asked why, he explains: “Being a bell boy
meant a lot of power. My leadership and responsiveness to humanity’s needs actually draws
a lot of lessons from that post. I tell you why. Being a bell boy, I saw how power if abused by
not ringing the bell in time stirred emotions and uproar from colleagues and even teachers
1 who were itching to hear the bell go in order to change lessons or have break. If I
manipulated my watch according to my whims and caprices, I saw the immediate effect in
the form of citizens rising against their governments today if they are manipulated.
Reflections of being a bell boy, honestly, defines my leadership and makes me sensitive to
the needs of the people I lead.” Through a programme of an international NGO called
ActionAid, Simon visited the capital city of Ghana – Accra –for the first time. “That
experience is a whole story on its own,” he says.
Simon passed his Junior High School West African Examinations Council’s exams very well
and entered Tamale Senior High School located about 150 miles away from his home. He
set off to boarding school as a science student taking up elective courses in Biology,
Physics, Chemistry and Mathematics. Unusually, he excelled in the school’s debating club
which was common for students who took up Government, History and English Literature as
elective subjects. “I was a fierce debater and I learnt the art of argumentation from my
debating classes with many other colleagues. In Tamasco, I served initially as the SRC
Organizing Secretary in my first year, became the General Secretary in my second year and
Vice President in my final year,” Simon discloses.
After high school, what next? “I qualified for the University but money was a problem. So I
opted to go to college. If you chose to go to college in Ghana to pursue a scarce skill
professional training, you were entitled to a monthly allowance. So I entered the Rural Health
Training School and trained as a Medical Laboratory Scientist and obtained my national
diploma in that field.” The college has since been renamed the College of Health and
Wellbeing. There in college, Simon was a founding member of the Medical Laboratory
Technology Students’ Association and became its first interim Deputy General Secretary in
his first year. By his second year, he rose to become the association’s first Vice President.
“That same year, I entered the SRC general elections and was voted as Vice President. I
had to resign my post as Vice President of our professional association for the higher
calling,” he states.
Early Professional Career
“I graduated in 2009 and was deployed to the Effia-Nkwanta regional hospital for my
compulsory clinical internship. Before I finished my clinicals, I got a phone call from my HoD
asking me if I will accept a job back in the college. I obliged and in October 2010, I reported
back to the college to join faculty,” Simon recalls. Asked to share his experiences, he says,
“it was a bittersweet experience. I was the youngest staff member. And, I had to work with
people who taught me just a year before. The challenge was, I had a dual responsibility and
one of them technically placed me above some of the very people who taught me as I
2 reported directly to the rector of the college in one of my roles. This placed me in a very tight
situation as I sometimes had to take or implement decisions that were not favourable for my
senior colleagues but in line with the college’s vision and mission. Indeed, I acquired a lot of
experience there.”
Did you play other roles in the college? “Yes, I played a lot of roles. As young and
inexperienced as I was, I later technically headed the department for about a year and half. I
was also involved in a World Health Organization Expanded Programme on Immunization as
a regional supervisor on several occasions. I led teams of independent monitors to various
regions of Ghana to supervise national immunization activities. Honestly, those were brighter
days in my life as I earned substantially in a week – mostly even more than my monthly
salary.” Beyond that role, “I coordinated the laboratory component of an international
programme between the College of Health and the University of Utah, Salt Lake city, USA.
That programme gave me a lot of exposure nationally and internationally”
Dark Days and the University of Johannesburg’s Endless Opportunities
Simon took an audacious and decisive step in his life by moving to South Africa to pursue
further education. It started off well from January 2015. February came and went and it was
smiles and enthusiasm. In April, dark days arrived. Simon recounts, “I was bound for KZN
that fateful morning. I was awoken at about 4 a.m. I checked under my pillow and could not
find my phone. I felt it had drifted aside. I had packed my laptop and the things I wanted to
travel with into my travelling bag the night before. I was still drowsy but I came to my full
senses immediately I realized the bag was gone. I intensified my search and finally it
dawned on me that everything was gone – my bank cards and other stuff. You know, I was a
self-funding student and so I held an international bank card from which I drew funds for my
upkeep. Friends and family were supporting me and I must acknowledge receiving financial
support from our Utah partners to fund my studies. That was the dawn of dark days to
follow.” And so what happened? “I defaulted in the payment of my monthly rent. I was
staying in an off-campus residence that claimed it was accredited by UJ but actually was not
and still isn’t. I returned from school one evening in May and all my belongings were gone. I
asked what was going on and the receptionist said my things had been taken to the store
and would only be released to me after I paid my rent. The security whisked me away.” And
where did you sleep that night? “Well, I am a survivor. I slept in the Lwazi building that night
and attempted the next morning to convince the residence management but they would not
listen to me. Winter was setting in in full swing. For the next couple of weeks, I slept in the
classrooms under the pretext of studying. Then exams came, the security would come round
to lock up the classrooms and I was technically kicked out again. There is a wall-mounted
3 fire hose in a cubicle in the Lwazi building. I resorted to that dungeon each night for the rest
of twenty one days in same clothes, pair of shoe and set of books. The fact is, that cubicle
only allows you to stand or squat…you can’t lie down. So I alternated between standing and
squatting for the rest of each night. I nearly quit school.”
How were you feeding yourself? “I borrowed from classmates...R100 at a time but it was
not sustainable and I had to find a way out.”
What was the way out? “Look, I must say UJ had and still has all the resources and
support structures for any student to succeed. The problem was, here was an international
student who did not know well about the opportunities or institutions of care here at UJ. But I
remembered about PsyCad. I felt shy to go to PsyCad though so I approached the SRC
welfare officer and narrated my plight. Immediately, she asked me ‘When was the last time
you ate?’ I said I didn’t remember. She pulled out R100 for me to go find myself a meal and
return for her to see what she could do. By the time I returned, she had already taken my
case to PsyCad and I was assigned a counselor. Kgomotso is an outstanding lady at
PsyCad. The SRC welfare officer arranged for me to squat in one of UJ’s residences (name
withheld) and they got me a blanket to keep warm. I took a long shower that day for the first
time in a month or so. To cut the story short, Kgomotso arranged with Shantelle who is a
welfare officer here in the international office and she called me immediately and asked that I
should come to the international office and see one of their director’s called Lebethe Malefo.
I met this gentleman whose sobriety shocked me as he interviewed me. I watched him as he
took notes and probed me for details of what I was going through. He reprimanded me
politely for not coming up with my problem from the outset but left me reassured and
revitalized. Before I left his office, he phoned the accommodation and residence life office in
the DFC campus where I study and asked that my stay in the residence in which I was
squatting be formalized and the bill forwarded to his office. I was dumbfounded. It did not
end there. He arranged with the Gift of the Givers for me to get two meals a day – breakfast
and dinner.”
Did this affect your studies? “Definitely. It did. But I was so determined that I could not
allow my situation to hamper my progress. I had that inherent faith and hope that my
situation was going to become a positive lesson for me someday.”
So please share, how are you funding your master’s studies? “I am not paying a dime
for my master’s studies. Every cent of my studies is paid for by the Mandela Rhodes
Foundation. You know, when I was going through all this last year, I failed to become
pessimistic of the future. I started searching for ways of funding my studies and then I read
of the MRF scholarship on the UJ’s website. I put together my application and submitted. To
4 my surprise, I received an email one day informing me that I had been shortlisted for the final
round of interviews. I was amazed. We were 5500+ applicants from across the continent and
75 of us made it to the finals and they wanted only 50. Not long after the interview, I received
a call informing me I had been awarded the Mandela Rhodes Scholarship so I should go find
myself any university and any programme of my choice. I said to myself, UJ deserves you. I
resolved I was staying here and here I am. Much more humbling is that in Cape Town during
our first Mandela Rhodes leadership workshop, I was officially informed that I was the first
Mandela Rhodes Scholar from Ghana and I saw my country’s flag planted on the wall of the
prestigious Rhodes building. I felt proud but I feel the weight of that responsibility bearing on
my shoulders. I have to live up to it and I will, I assure you”
What about the BYM summit you are attending this June? “Well, it is an organization
that identifies 100 brightest young minds across Africa every year and brings them together
to interact and network. I received an email earlier this month from CEO Dhiren Govender
stating that after a rigorous selection process, I had been selected and invited to participate
in this year’s summit. I look forward to meeting my colleagues, 99 brightest young minds
from around the continent for an impactful summit.” Congratulations Simon!
Before we end this interview, I will like to know what keeps you going. “Well,
providence first of all and a Victorian poem titled invictus which was written by William Ernest
Henley in 1875 and published in 1888. I recite that poem by heart every day and anywhere.
It gives me a lot of strength.”
Future Plans
“I am still on a path of discovery. I am unsure what I want to do in future but I am likely to
drift away from academia and research someday into policy. I also will like to complete my
PhD before I return to full time work, especially now I have defeated Goliath! I don’t want a
break again in my next career,” says Simon.
Synopsis of Mr. Aseno’s Profile
In
2010,
Simon’s
essay
received
recognition
by
the
Goi
Peace
Foundation,
Japan/UNESCO’s world peace essay competition. In 2011, he received a World Bank/OCDE
international essay competition certificate for his recognized essay. He holds a certificate in
Conflict Analysis and Prevention from the United States Institute of Peace (2010), a
certificate in Writing in the Sciences from Stanford University (2013), a certificate in Global
Tuberculosis (TB) Clinical Management and Research from the John Hopkins University
(2013), a certificate in Epidemiology: the Basic Science of Public Health from the University
of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (2014) and a certificate in the Design and Interpretation of
5 Clinical Trials from the John Hopkins University (2014). He holds two other certificates in
Basic and Advanced Health Research Ethics (2010) from the Africa Malaria Network Trust,
Tanzania.
He completed his bachelor’s degree here in the University of Johannesburg in Biomedical
Technology and currently pursuing his master’s degree in Biomedical Technology under the
supervision of Prof. TG Barnard, Dr. Atheesha Singh and Mrs. Jennifer Pienaar. His
research focuses on membrane modifications that occur in Escherichia coli following
exposure to selected nanoparticles at the Water and Health Research Centre (WHRC) of the
Faculty of Health Sciences.
Simon has since registered and chairs the board of a nascent NGO called the Peoples
Foundation for Health and Education Development to be operated in his hometown in
Ghana.
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