Phethiwe Matutu (Dr)

Chief Executive Officer
Universities South Africa

Dr Phethiwe Matutu took office at USAF in October 2022, after five years as the Group Executive: Strategy, Planning and Partnerships at the National Research Foundation. There she was responsible for strategy, strategic planning and performance monitoring, strategic partnerships, and information and analysis. For nine years prior to that she had occupied the position of Chief Director: Human Capital and Science Promotion in the former Department of Science and Technology (DST).

A mathematician by discipline, Dr Matutu holds a PhD in Mathematics from the University of Cape Town. She obtained a Master’s in Science, Mathematics with distinction from Rhodes University, an Honours in Science, Mathematics, from the same institution and a BSc in Mathematics and Chemistry from the former University of Transkei. She attended the “Insight into King IV” at the Institute of Directors in South Africa to advance her governance capabilities, and her competence in equity, diversity and inclusion has been broadened by obtaining an “Equity and Transformation Facilitator certificate” from Wits University.

She brings with her solid academic and policy-making credentials, having taught mathematics for 16 years until 2008, at no fewer than five of South Africa’s universities and worked in a policy environment for another 14 years. Her teaching career culminated in a senior lectureship in Rhodes University’s Department of Mathematics in 2004, a position she held until 2008.

At the former Department of Science and Technology, Dr Matutu successfully led the strategy development in research priority areas of Government, science promotion and Human Capital Development, leading to transformative change and maximising of research impact. Among her notable achievements was the growth of the Human Capital Development budget, particularly, for researchers and post-graduate student support from the National Treasury. This was a culmination of ongoing direction setting through guiding documents for entities, and evidence-based casebuilding. Her leadership of the portfolio led to its growth, so much that it was split before she left the Department.

At the NRF, Dr Matutu successfully drove the formulation of the macro-organisational strategy, led the conceptualisation of the establishment of a Research and Development Information Platform for Research and Development data for the National System of Innovation (NSI), and had oversight of the management of key strategic partnerships that are instrumental in leveraging knowledge, human, and financial resources from partners. Among other notable achievements, her division spearheaded the research impact agenda within the NSI, a relatively new initiative, conceptualised and positioned the African Open Science Platform, a continental, multi-partner initiative to put African scientists at the cutting edge of data-intensive science.

Dr Matutu has served at various committees and structures. They include being a Ministerial appointee to the Walter Sisulu University Council until 2011; a Ministerial Task Team member for the Drafting of the Implementation Plan for the White Paper on Post-School Education and Training in the Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET) from 2016 to 2017, a Ministerial Appointee to the Council for South African Natural Scientific Professions in the former DST, from 2010 to 2017, to name a few instances.