Oprah opens school for girls in S. Africa

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa – Oprah Winfrey opened a school Tuesday for disadvantaged girls, fulfilling a promise she made to former President Nelson Mandela six years ago and giving more than 150 students a chance for a better future.

“I wanted to give this opportunity to girls who had a light so bright that not even poverty could dim that light,” Winfrey said at a news conference.

Mandela, 88, attended the opening ceremony of the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy for Girls in the small town of Henley-on-Klip, south of Johannesburg.

“It is my hope that this school will become the dream of every South African girl and they will study hard and qualify for the school one day,” he said.

“This is not a distant donation but a project that clearly lies close to your heart,” said the anti-apartheid leader who became multiracial South Africa’s first democratically elected president in 1994.

Singers Tina Turner, Mary J. Blige and Mariah Carey, actors Sidney Poitier and Chris Tucker, and director Spike Lee also were in attendance. Each guest was asked to bring a personally inscribed book for the library.

Winfrey has said that she decided to build her own school because she wanted to feel closer to the people she was trying to help.

The $40 million academy aims to give 152 girls from deprived backgrounds a quality education in a country where schools are struggling to overcome the legacy of apartheid.

By educating girls, Winfrey said she hoped she could help “change the face of a nation.”

“Girls who are educated are less likely to get HIV/AIDS, and in this country which has such a pandemic, we have to begin to change the pandemic,” she said.

Many of the girls come from families affected by the disease, which has infected 5.4 million of the 48 million population and hit women disproportionately hard.

The idea for the school was born in 2000 at a meeting between Winfrey and Mandela. She said she decided to build the academy in South Africa rather than the United States out of love and respect for Mandela and because of her own African roots.

She said she planned a second school for boys and girls in the eastern province of KwaZulu-Natal.

Many state-funded schools, especially in the sprawling townships that sprang up under white racist rule, are hopelessly overcrowded and lack even basic necessities such as books. They also are plagued by gang violence, drugs and a high rate of pregnancy among schoolgirls.

Top-class study and sports facilities are available but are largely confined to private schools that are still dominated by the white minority, since they are too expensive for many black and mixed-race South Africans.

Winfrey’s academy received 3,500 applications from across the country. A total of 152 girls ages 11 and 12 were accepted.

To qualify, they had to show both academic and leadership potential and have a household income of no more than $787 a month. Eventually, the academy will accommodate 450 girls.