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The Democratic Alliance (DA) is disheartened but not dismayed at the news that the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) bid has to be shared with Australia.

Today, Africa Day, we yearned to win the SKA bid to exemplify the African dream outright. There could have been no better start to the African Century than to build the SKA in South Africa and its eight African partner countries.

But it is not be. Unlike our famous 438 cricket victory in which the world gave us no hope of chasing down the Aussie total, today we have to settle for a draw.

A draw is no loss, though, and the majority of physical infrastructure in phase one will be built in South Africa, combined with the 64-dish MeerKAT project. And the SKA advisory committee did identify Southern Africa as the preferred site. All the dishes and the mid-frequency aperture arrays for phase two of the SKA will be built in Southern African.

The SKA aims to answer five unsolved scientific questions, including a verification of whether Einstein’s theory of relativity is empirically verifiable and how the first black holes and stars were formed.

Peace, prosperity and productivity in Africa are strongly contingent on technological innovation. The latent socio-economic benefit of the SKA project cannot be overstated. Aside from the share of the R23 billion capital investment, the attraction of skills and the creation of subsidiary industries is the kind of boost of confidence that is both necessary and warranted. The DA welcomes this unequivocally.

Primary determinants of sustainable economic growth are investments in human and physical capital. The infrastructure benefits of power, roads and communication cannot be overstated. Telecommunication will be especially enhanced through the laying of a new fibre-optic cable.

That we will receive the lion’s share of the biggest ever scientific project may serve to reverse the trajectory of dead aid that has characterised the African continent and signal a new era of cutting edge investment that incisively builds our knowledge economy.

South Africa is currently in the process of commissioning the completed KAT-7 telescope, consisting of seven dishes that serve as an engineering prototype for the 64-dish MeerKAT project. The KAT-7, even though it is only a precursor to the MeerKAT, is a remarkably useful instrument in its own right. It has already delivered images of Centaurus A, a galaxy 14-million light years away. The SKA will essentially be a continuation of these prototypes. That these projects were already in place boosted our bid in terms of cost efficiency and potential returns to scale. Certainly it provides the antidote to Australian Science Minister Chris Evans’ suggestion that ours was a sympathy “aid mind-set” developmental bid. The evidence shows that today we drew, if not won, on merit.

The evidence shows that we have what it takes to warrant the investment. We have stunned the world with our scientific capacity, as the site evaluation bid by the world’s foremost independent experts has verified. On every criterion, we have more than met the requirements.

South Africans can still be overjoyed that such a prestigious investment is heading our way.