The Winners Circle
Raenette with Italian ambassador Alberto Vecchi on the day she received the Knight of the Order of the Star of Italy award.
The Cavaliere dell’Ordine della Stella d’Italia (Knight of the Order of the Star of Italy) Award.
RAENETTE GOTTARDO: FROM STUDENT LEADER TO DRONE WARFARE SPECIALIST
Economics following the award of the Helen Suzman FCO Chevening Award. Apart from her BA (Law) Gottardo’s UJ degrees were all awarded cum laude. The formative power of university life Gottardo spent her early student years at the Rand Afrikaans University (now the University of Johannesburg, or UJ), a period she describes as particularly dynamic. Navigating her studies against the backdrop of South Africa’s transition to democracy, she found herself not just witnessing but actively participating in the tides of change. “The dynamism of those years, and the institution’s efforts to respond to change in a dynamic way, allowed me, as a member of the SRC at the time, to learn from the institutional experience about resilience and change.” These foundational lessons, she says, continue to inform her approach to professional and personal growth. Political science and an early calling “To have an international career was not an explicit objective at the time but it became an eventual consequence of my political exposure at a young age,” says Gottardo. At the age of 25, her time as the youngest female Member of Parliament representing the Democratic Party (DP) and later the Democratic Alliance (DA) from 1999 to 2004 naturally led her into the global sphere, she says. As a politician she was probably best known for her tenure in the Standing Committee of Public Accounts from 2001 to 2002, where she was a leading critic of the Arms Deal, a massive defence procurement package that was marred by allegations of corruption by ANC politicians. In November 2004, she resigned from the DA, Parliament and frontline politics, following internal party disagreements.
South African academic and former politician, Raenette Gottardo, is a living example of how resilience, adaptability, and a commitment to growth can forge a path through times of transition and uncertainty. With a career spanning the corridors of Parliament and the halls of academia, her journey is testament to a relentless quest for growth, shaped as much by the crucible of early political exposure as by the lessons learned during South Africa’s transition to democracy. Based in South Africa, and holding multiple advanced degrees, including a doctorate in political science from Stellenbosch University, she now works as an independent international consultant, continuing her commitment to public service and scholarship with expertise in public policy, politics, and defence and foreign policy. Flying high Gottardo’s many achievements, apart from her political career, include being awarded the title of Cavaliere dell’Ordine della Stella d’Italia (Knight of the Order of the Star of Italy) by President Sergio Mattarella of Italy. An Italian citizen, she received the certificate and insignia of the Order from the Italian Ambassador in South Africa, Alberto Vecchi. She is an alumna of the Young Global Leader of the World Economic Forum, an ALI Aspen Institute Fellow and a past attendee of the Future Leaders Invitation Programme (PIPA) of the French Ministry for Europe. She is an alumna of the Duke University-UCT Centre for Leadership and Public Values, and an alumna of The Prince of Wales’s Business and Sustainability Programme at Cambridge University’s Institute for Sustainability. Gottardo is a Yale University Maurice R. Greenberg Fellow and completed her MSc Public Policy degree (cum laude) at the London School of
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