Antony Melck
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Professor Antony Melck is the Rector of the University of Pretoria, and former Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University of South Africa (Unisa).
Professor Melck was educated at a number of universities, both within South Africa and abroad. He received the M.Com and LL.B degrees from the University of Stellenbosch before being awarded a scholarship to the University of Cambridge (England) where he was awarded his M.A. in Economics. On returning to the University of Stellenbosch to lecture, he began research on the Economics of Education for which he was later awarded the D.Com degree.
While engaged in these programmes Professor Melck was awarded the Licentiate in Music (Organ) (L.T.C.L.) and later the Fellowship Diploma (F.T.C.L.) by the Trinity College of Music in London.
Prof Melck taught commercial law at the University of Stellenbosch for a brief period and was admitted as an advocate of the Cape Supreme Court. After lecturing in Economics for a number of years, Professor Melck was appointed professor of economics at Stellenbosch in 1983, after which he was awarded an Alexander von Humboldt fellowship to Germany where he spent a year as visiting professor at the University of Cologne. His research in the fields of the Economics of Education and Public Finance led to his involvement on various committees and commissions in the public sector ranging from education to taxation – and his chairing of the SAUVCA Finance Committee, of which he has been a member since 1988.
In 1988 he became Registrar (Finance) at Unisa, after which, in 1991, he was promoted to Vice Principal at Unisa.
From 1994 to 1997 he was seconded by Unisa to be fulltime deputy chairman of the Financial and Fiscal Commission (FFC), the constitutional body that advises Parliament on the division of financial resources amongst the national, provincial and local spheres of government. In 2002 he was reappointed by the President for a five-year term as a part-time FFC commissioner.
During 1998, Professor Melck was Acting Principal and Vice-Chancellor of Unisa. After the only democratic election for a principal at Unisa, involving all university stakeholders, he was appointed Principal and Vice-Chancellor from the beginning of 1999, positions that he held until the end of September 2001.
Professor Melck’s engagement in community service has led to his becoming chairman of the Governing Body of the Pretoria Boys High School, a board member of the Zuid Afrikaans Hospital, President of the Unisa International Music Competitions, director of the Chamber Orchestra of South Africa, council member of the Pretoria Association of Arts, a board member of a number of charitable trusts, and patron of the State Theatre Youth Arts Festival. In 1999 the degree Doctor of Humane Letters (honoris causa) was conferred on him by the Thomas Edison State College (New Jersey, USA), in recognition of his contributions to South African society, particularly to (distance) education.
After the expiry of his term of office as Principal and Vice-Chancellor at Unisa, a position for which he did not reapply in order to facilitate transformation at the university, Professor Melck was appointed advisor to the Rector of the University of Pretoria. He accepted this position, which entails being a member of the Executive Committee of the University of Pretoria, as from October 2001.
He is married to Gudrun Behrens, a ‘cello teacher. They have three sons, Gustav, Marcus and Alexander.
