Date: 24/06/2004
Source: North West Provincial Government
Title: M Mayisela: DENOSA North West Provincial Constitutional Congress
OPENING ADDRESS BY NORTH WEST HEALTH MEC MANDLENKOSI MAYISELA AT THE DENOSA NORTH WEST PROVINCIAL CONSTITUTIONAL CONGRESS, MAFIKENG, 24 June 2004
Just after 14h00 on Tuesday, 22 June 2004, I pledged on behalf of our department that, as we change gears and accelerate the pace of health service delivery we would do so in partnership with our honoured stakeholders.
Our engagements and participation at this Congress, today, represent our practical response to those undertakings.
I am very pleased to have been invited here to deliver this opening address at this historic Congress. I am told that delegates gathered here today are doing so under the theme "Nurses crushing the shell of political malnutrition" * what an interesting theme I must say.
Programme Director, I have been asked by the organisers to among others address the effects of the restrictive constitution of nurses in the previous regime vis-avis the current political trend. Surely Comrades will agree with me that, those types of thinking belong to the dustbin of history.
The free union activity that we are witnessing in the post-apartheid South Africa was a dream only a few years ago. The beauty of our democracy resides in the fact that allows for a diversity of views, be they religious, political, economic or labour-related. Today, across the spectrum of our nation, expressed in different sectoral organisations and even individuals, we have an environment where a thousand schools of thought compete.
The freedom we have achieved today as a people, including the right to organise and advance the cause of the working class, was brought about by the mass struggles of our people. Through their relentless struggles, they put into power a democratic government, which committed itself to defending the freedoms for which many of our people have laid down their lives.
Batho Pele and the Patients' Rights Charter demand that health workers put the welfare and plight of our patients first.
Programme Director, this and other tasks I have alluded to above require that you should have a clear political conscience and understanding. It also means that in executing your work, BOTHO and the love for your patients and community should practically flow from your actions.
Your commitment to Batho Pele and the Patients' Rights Charter must also mean that you will not tolerate to have within your ranks any member who violates patients' rights and make a mockery of our adherence to the Batho Pele principles.
You must be worried about the negative perception that ordinary people have about health workers, especially nurses. Rightly or wrongly, some of our people's perception of nurses is largely negative. Health workers are seen as rude, always on tea breaks and disrespectful to our aged.
This perception, Programme Director, cannot be allowed to continue. Through our own practical actions, we must strive to project a positive image of profession. We must embark on a concerted effort to transform the public image of our members. They must be seen to be polite, humane and dedicated to their work.
Together with government, organised labour must be an agent for change. It is politically correct for you as nurses to join the people's contract to better the provision of decent and quality health care service. This is also a call for a new cadre of community health worker and union member who is more concerned about the broader transformation challenges facing the health sector than the size of his / her pay cheque.
That comrades, is being political and understanding the enormous challenges facing our public health sector. Perhaps we need to pause here and remind ourselves that a better life must be for all our people. It should not be limited to a few of us. Let us not fail our profession.
Our unions must remain robust, vigilant and continue to guard against individuals who join unions in order to extract maximum material benefits only for themselves without giving anything meaningful in return to the nation. We must intensify our political education programmes and link them to our current transformation challenges.
Having said that, I wish to congratulate hundreds of nurses across the province who, by their own conduct and performance, continues to epitomise the nursing profession. Many of them continue to go beyond the call of duty to deliver quality health care to their fellow citizens. Their commitment, dedication and personal sacrifices continue to inspire us all.
To that effect I want to pay special tribute to Sister Masako, Nurse Mere and Mama Leballo (cleaner) from Phidisong1 clinic in Ga-rankuwa. They defied the chilli weather conditions and total blackout from the power failure and brought to mother earth, two new healthy babies using the light from their cell phones in August last year.
For them nursing remains primarily a calling rather than a lucrative career. Passion for their work counts more than the material benefits it brings. They continue to help, in their own small way, to strengthen the community's confidence in the profession and our health institutions. Again, each union, DENOSA included, must ask itself whether we can truly say the same about their members.
Programme Director, comrades, these nurses I have just mentioned above were very much political in their approach. They understood that, the lives of these young babies come first. They managed to turn strenuous conditions into challenges and using a simple tool of analysis, delivered. That is "crushing the shell of political malnutrition."
DENOSA by its very nature is the home of experience and high academic achievers. I also am aware that many members of DENOSA members have retired and may soon go into retirement.
Programme Director, let me informally indicate that we will be engaging with yourselves on the need for these experienced health workers to reconsider re-joining the profession and assisting us with the challenges of accelerating health care service delivery especially in the area of our comprehensive HIV and AIDS, care, treatment and management plan.
We will in not so distant future start the consultations with your good-selves.
It is my hope that the matters I raised this morning will be discussed at this congress and other relevant forums of your organisation. Before I accent the stage I would like to throw in the following points as important issues that we need to also look at especially in this current political conjuncture:
* General Health priorities
* Nurses have to strive to understand the policies of this government, e.g. the Health Sector Strategic Frame work (encompassing the 10 point plan), which is based on the RDP, the ANC National Health Plan, etc
* Nurses have to take advantage of the culture of participatory democracy and belong to structures in our institutions. In those structures where they participate as management, they have to constantly strive at providing the necessary suggestions and leadership instead of negative criticism of the government of which they are part
* Nurses, being at the rock-face and having that chance of bringing about transformation, have to realise that the policies of this government are in the main excellent. However, nurses will be doing South Africa a disservice if they do not, together with other workers in our clinics, community centres, hospitals and various offices provide solutions for us to get rid of blockages to delivery
* Nurses are, on the main, the middle management of our department and health sector. They have a duty to promote implementation of government programs and policies. They have the skills to translate departmental directives and the MECs directives into implantable programs. They have a duty to provide leadership without resorting to academic, class and professional arrogance. The nursing profession is, by its nature, humble and gentle
Finally, comrades, I am optimistic that this Congress will allow DENOSA to look at itself and understand its role as that of a positive stakeholder and not adversary, in the context of its membership to COSATU and the Tripartite Alliance and participants in the realisation of a people's contract.
It is in this context that as the department we will be intensifying our engagements with yourselves particularly around the urgent issue of community service by our nurses and health workers in particular. Linked to this will be our further consultation, and continuous development of our rural allowance and scares skill allowances we have recently introduce as part of the conditions of service.
The challenges of speeding up delivery and changing the phase of our public health system are enormous. We will only overcome them if everybody put the shoulder to the wheel.
I wish well in your Congress.
Thank you very much.
Issued by: Department of Health, North West Provincial Government
24 June 2004
Source: North West Provincial Government
Title: M Mayisela: DENOSA North West Provincial Constitutional Congress
OPENING ADDRESS BY NORTH WEST HEALTH MEC MANDLENKOSI MAYISELA AT THE DENOSA NORTH WEST PROVINCIAL CONSTITUTIONAL CONGRESS, MAFIKENG, 24 June 2004
Just after 14h00 on Tuesday, 22 June 2004, I pledged on behalf of our department that, as we change gears and accelerate the pace of health service delivery we would do so in partnership with our honoured stakeholders.
Our engagements and participation at this Congress, today, represent our practical response to those undertakings.
I am very pleased to have been invited here to deliver this opening address at this historic Congress. I am told that delegates gathered here today are doing so under the theme "Nurses crushing the shell of political malnutrition" * what an interesting theme I must say.
Programme Director, I have been asked by the organisers to among others address the effects of the restrictive constitution of nurses in the previous regime vis-avis the current political trend. Surely Comrades will agree with me that, those types of thinking belong to the dustbin of history.
The free union activity that we are witnessing in the post-apartheid South Africa was a dream only a few years ago. The beauty of our democracy resides in the fact that allows for a diversity of views, be they religious, political, economic or labour-related. Today, across the spectrum of our nation, expressed in different sectoral organisations and even individuals, we have an environment where a thousand schools of thought compete.
The freedom we have achieved today as a people, including the right to organise and advance the cause of the working class, was brought about by the mass struggles of our people. Through their relentless struggles, they put into power a democratic government, which committed itself to defending the freedoms for which many of our people have laid down their lives.
Batho Pele and the Patients' Rights Charter demand that health workers put the welfare and plight of our patients first.
Programme Director, this and other tasks I have alluded to above require that you should have a clear political conscience and understanding. It also means that in executing your work, BOTHO and the love for your patients and community should practically flow from your actions.
Your commitment to Batho Pele and the Patients' Rights Charter must also mean that you will not tolerate to have within your ranks any member who violates patients' rights and make a mockery of our adherence to the Batho Pele principles.
You must be worried about the negative perception that ordinary people have about health workers, especially nurses. Rightly or wrongly, some of our people's perception of nurses is largely negative. Health workers are seen as rude, always on tea breaks and disrespectful to our aged.
This perception, Programme Director, cannot be allowed to continue. Through our own practical actions, we must strive to project a positive image of profession. We must embark on a concerted effort to transform the public image of our members. They must be seen to be polite, humane and dedicated to their work.
Together with government, organised labour must be an agent for change. It is politically correct for you as nurses to join the people's contract to better the provision of decent and quality health care service. This is also a call for a new cadre of community health worker and union member who is more concerned about the broader transformation challenges facing the health sector than the size of his / her pay cheque.
That comrades, is being political and understanding the enormous challenges facing our public health sector. Perhaps we need to pause here and remind ourselves that a better life must be for all our people. It should not be limited to a few of us. Let us not fail our profession.
Our unions must remain robust, vigilant and continue to guard against individuals who join unions in order to extract maximum material benefits only for themselves without giving anything meaningful in return to the nation. We must intensify our political education programmes and link them to our current transformation challenges.
Having said that, I wish to congratulate hundreds of nurses across the province who, by their own conduct and performance, continues to epitomise the nursing profession. Many of them continue to go beyond the call of duty to deliver quality health care to their fellow citizens. Their commitment, dedication and personal sacrifices continue to inspire us all.
To that effect I want to pay special tribute to Sister Masako, Nurse Mere and Mama Leballo (cleaner) from Phidisong1 clinic in Ga-rankuwa. They defied the chilli weather conditions and total blackout from the power failure and brought to mother earth, two new healthy babies using the light from their cell phones in August last year.
For them nursing remains primarily a calling rather than a lucrative career. Passion for their work counts more than the material benefits it brings. They continue to help, in their own small way, to strengthen the community's confidence in the profession and our health institutions. Again, each union, DENOSA included, must ask itself whether we can truly say the same about their members.
Programme Director, comrades, these nurses I have just mentioned above were very much political in their approach. They understood that, the lives of these young babies come first. They managed to turn strenuous conditions into challenges and using a simple tool of analysis, delivered. That is "crushing the shell of political malnutrition."
DENOSA by its very nature is the home of experience and high academic achievers. I also am aware that many members of DENOSA members have retired and may soon go into retirement.
Programme Director, let me informally indicate that we will be engaging with yourselves on the need for these experienced health workers to reconsider re-joining the profession and assisting us with the challenges of accelerating health care service delivery especially in the area of our comprehensive HIV and AIDS, care, treatment and management plan.
We will in not so distant future start the consultations with your good-selves.
It is my hope that the matters I raised this morning will be discussed at this congress and other relevant forums of your organisation. Before I accent the stage I would like to throw in the following points as important issues that we need to also look at especially in this current political conjuncture:
* General Health priorities
* Nurses have to strive to understand the policies of this government, e.g. the Health Sector Strategic Frame work (encompassing the 10 point plan), which is based on the RDP, the ANC National Health Plan, etc
* Nurses have to take advantage of the culture of participatory democracy and belong to structures in our institutions. In those structures where they participate as management, they have to constantly strive at providing the necessary suggestions and leadership instead of negative criticism of the government of which they are part
* Nurses, being at the rock-face and having that chance of bringing about transformation, have to realise that the policies of this government are in the main excellent. However, nurses will be doing South Africa a disservice if they do not, together with other workers in our clinics, community centres, hospitals and various offices provide solutions for us to get rid of blockages to delivery
* Nurses are, on the main, the middle management of our department and health sector. They have a duty to promote implementation of government programs and policies. They have the skills to translate departmental directives and the MECs directives into implantable programs. They have a duty to provide leadership without resorting to academic, class and professional arrogance. The nursing profession is, by its nature, humble and gentle
Finally, comrades, I am optimistic that this Congress will allow DENOSA to look at itself and understand its role as that of a positive stakeholder and not adversary, in the context of its membership to COSATU and the Tripartite Alliance and participants in the realisation of a people's contract.
It is in this context that as the department we will be intensifying our engagements with yourselves particularly around the urgent issue of community service by our nurses and health workers in particular. Linked to this will be our further consultation, and continuous development of our rural allowance and scares skill allowances we have recently introduce as part of the conditions of service.
The challenges of speeding up delivery and changing the phase of our public health system are enormous. We will only overcome them if everybody put the shoulder to the wheel.
I wish well in your Congress.
Thank you very much.
Issued by: Department of Health, North West Provincial Government
24 June 2004
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