By Sanaa Maja
My first impression of the managing director of the South African Radio Astronomy Observatory (SARAO), Pontsho Maruping, is that she has little patience with being fussed over.
Before our interview begins, a colleague offers a gentle caveat. Maruping has just returned from a business trip and is feeling under the weather, so I should go easy on her.
Maruping quips without missing a beat: “I am not fragile.”
The space leader turns 60 this year, marking a milestone in a career that has helped shape South Africa’s scientific ambitions in space science and radio astronomy.
Maruping has what many would describe as “oldest daughter energy” — a quiet confidence with a deep sense of responsibility. “I spent my formative years living in Soweto,” she says. “My mom was a nurse and my dad an entrepreneur. I am the eldest of three girls and the mother of one daughter.”
Family remains one of the most important anchors in her life. “I’m good friends with my sisters. We celebrate each other and hold each other accountable. We get it from our mother, who is the strongest woman I know,” she says. “She survived breast cancer and fought hard to make sure her children valued education. As a result, we have all found success in our own ways, and we always knew we had her support to pursue our dreams.”
I was always the child who wanted to pull toys apart and then put them together.
— Pontsho Maruping
Maruping feels a responsibility to lead by example. “I have always felt that I need to be fearless,” she says. “Because I need to be a role model for my sisters and my daughter so they can also be brave.”
Growing up in Meadowlands, Soweto, in the years after the 1976 Soweto uprising, Maruping inherited not only a deep appreciation for education but also a strong sense of justice. The struggle for equal education had unfolded in the streets of her community and shaped the values of a generation. “There was a lot of unrest,” she remembers. “Young people were very politically aware. So every time I see injustice, I want to step in. It’s very important to me to see people being treated the way I would want to be treated.”
She pursued that commitment as far as she could. Maruping earned a BSc in mineral processing engineering from the University of the Witwatersrand, followed by a BEng (Honours) in management of technology from the University of Pretoria. She later completed a master’s in space systems engineering at the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands and an executive MBA at IMD Business School in Switzerland.
“For as long as I can remember, I have been interested in science and engineering,” she says. “I was always the child who wanted to pull toys apart and then put them together. I love building things, and this also shows in my hobbies, like Lego.”
Maruping says she did not realise this was a career option growing up until she entered the mining industry through Anglo American. She worked in the lab responsible for samples, and it was there that she became interested in engineering. She quit and went back to school to study full-time. “When the first democratic government was elected, I wanted to be involved in building up the country’s scientific systems so that they serve the whole population. While I was there, I started working in space. I never looked back,” she says.
Today, Maruping leads the organisation at the heart of South Africa’s radio astronomy programme, overseeing the operation of the MeerKAT radio telescope and the country’s role in building the Square Kilometre Array (SKA), the international telescope that will become the world’s largest and most sensitive radio observatory.
This July marks eight years since the inauguration of MeerKAT in the Northern Cape. In that time, the instrument has become one of the world’s premier scientific facilities, enabling discoveries that have led to more than 700 peer-reviewed publications. From revealing previously unseen galaxies and probing the environments around black holes to mapping vast structures in the cosmos, MeerKAT has established South Africa as a global leader in radio astronomy.
“South Africa was awarded the hosting of part of the SKA, while the other part is hosted in Australia. As part of that journey, we built a pathfinder telescope and ended up creating one of the world’s most impressive instruments — MeerKAT — which will eventually be integrated into the SKA,” she says.
But her role extends far beyond overseeing world-class telescopes. “Part of my responsibility is to make sure MeerKAT is successful, while also developing the human capital South Africa needs. We work with universities to support students and researchers, and we look after South Africa’s interests in the SKA,” she adds.
That investment in people has become one of the highlights of her career. “We are seeing many who started with us as young researchers become seasoned scientists, senior faculty members at universities and mentors in their own right. Seeing them train the next generation and seeing people who look like them succeed has been incredibly rewarding,” Maruping says.
She believes that while progress has been made for women in science, the conversation needs to move beyond simply getting more girls into STEM. “Having more women as role models will help bring more girls into STEM careers,” she states. “But we also need to better support women in the early stages of their careers. Those are often the years when they are raising young families, while also trying to establish themselves professionally. We haven’t completely figured out how to support women through that yet, but there are promising examples from countries like India.”
Maruping is encouraged by the growing number of women taking up leadership positions in science worldwide. “Just seeing how different women lead and the different energy they bring to the room is very exciting,” she says. “Seeing women do so well is incredibly inspiring. I am looking forward to the day when women in STEM are no longer something we have to talk about.”
One of the biggest barriers she still sees, however, is confidence. “I’ve noticed that women often feel they have to be certain they can do something before they’ll put themselves forward. We can be our own harshest critics.”
This is why her advice echoes one of science’s most fundamental principles. “In science, we say, ‘Try and try again.’ Even if you fail, that failure is a result. It tells you something. You need to do the best that you can. Be willing to challenge yourself, to try and to fail, and then get up again. Never let someone tell you what you can or can’t do. Trust your own abilities.”
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