Accessing collective memory: case study of a South African nature conservation institution

Abstract

As a government body, South African National Parks (SANParks) is responsible for nature conservation, tourism and socio-economic development of communities neighbouring the national game reserves. Government bodies, like SANParks, fall within the scope of public entities that must comply with the South African national archive legislation. According to Sections 3(a) and (b) of the National Archives and Records Service Act, No. 43 of 1996, two of the objectives of the National Archives are to preserve public and non-public records with enduring value for use by the public and the State; and to make such records accessible, while promoting their public use. Section 12(1) of the National Archives and Records Service Act requires public records that are regarded as having enduring value to be made available to the public, when the period of 20 years has elapsed, since the end of the year in which the records have come into existence. SANParks has a wealth of information stored in its archives, which should be made available to interested members of the public. As remarked by Ngoepe (2019), SANParks has the capability of enabling the South African National Archives to build an inclusive archive in South Africa by participating and opening their collections for public access. Apart from discussing the challenges associated with accessing such archival collections and the lack of interest in assisting SANParks in ensuring the availability of their collections, this paper proposes potential solutions to make valuable collections, including oral history collections, housed by South African government bodies available to interested members of the public.