National University of Science and Technology

From 1991

Also known as NUST.

Zimbabwe's second public university, established by Act of Parliament in 1991 to give Bulawayo a university focused on science and technology; on its own campus at Ascot since 1998.

For most of the twentieth century, a Bulawayo school-leaver who wanted a university education had to leave Bulawayo. NUST changed that. It was the country’s second public university, created specifically to be in Bulawayo and to teach science, technology and commerce.

Beginnings

A government commission, which reported on 1 February 1989, concluded that the country needed a second university and that it should be in Bulawayo with a science and technology focus. A Bill went to Parliament in October 1990, and NUST was established by Act of Parliament in 1991.

It opened its doors on 8 April 1991 with 270 students and 28 academic staff in three faculties: Commerce, Industrial Technology and Applied Sciences. Its first Vice-Chancellor, Professor Phineas Makhurane, was appointed in May 1991.

For its first years the university had no campus of its own. Bulawayo City Council donated a site of about 160 hectares at Ascot, and building began in 1993 with the administration block. Commerce, chemistry and chemical engineering, the first hostel, the library and the ceremonial hall followed. Students moved onto the new campus on 1 August 1998.

What the photographs show

The photographs in this set show the new campus some seven years after the move. They include the front entrance and gate, the Ceremonial Boulevard, the circular building students called “The Drum,” the commemorative plaque, the North, South, East and West Wings of the main complex, the Faculty of Commerce block, Chemical Engineering, the Students’ Affairs wing, the foyer, the administration gardens, and students between classes.

What we don’t know yet

• Where NUST taught before 1998. Its first students attended classes somewhere in the city for seven years. Where were they?
• What “The Drum” is. We know the name, but what is the building used for?
• The first intake. If you were one of the 270 students of April 1991, or among the first staff, we would very much like to hear from you. Those years are not well recorded anywhere we have found.

69 photographs of National University of Science and Technology →