Date: 27/04/2007

Source: The Presidency

Title: Mlambo-Ngcuka: Freedom Day celebrations

Speech delivered by Deputy President, Mrs Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, during the Freedom Day celebrations in Bloemfontein

27 April 2007

"A national partnership to build a better life for all"

Premier, Beatrice Marshoff
Minister of Public Enterprises, Alec Erwin
MECs
Mayors
Councillors
Leadership of our political parties, ANC the ruling party and all others here
MPs
MPLs
Religious leaders
People of the Free State and people of South Africa

The Freedom Day celebrations today mark the 13th anniversary of our freedom.

It is a time to reflect about the progress we have made together as people of South Africa, supported by many friends from all over the world.

It is also a time to acknowledge our challenges while our challenges do not overshadow our successes, as long as there are South Africans who are hungry and vulnerable our work is not over.

In 1994, 27 April, millions of our people exercised their hard won right to vote for the first time.

Millions of our people young and old chose the ANC as the first democratic government. They gave a responsibility to the ANC to make their lives better.

In that vote they wanted their dignity back, they wanted equal and full citizenship. They wanted South Africa to be a country that belongs to all who live in it (legally) black and white.

South Africa is now a country that is at peace with its neighbours. A government that allocates the resources of the state in favour of the poor. Today South Africa is a country that has almost 100% of its children at school and now we strive to improve the quality of education for all those children.

Today our hungry children are given food through a feeding scheme because we care about the nutrition of our children.

Today we have a country where men and women black or white can reach the top run a reserve bank, be a principal of a university, be a government minister and lead public institutions. All South Africans irrespective of race colour or creed can be a president, run large businesses and be ambassadors and judges.

South Africa today is for all of us.

In 1994 our people chose a government that responded to their basic needs. A government that gives free medical care to pregnant women and children build house and roads for them and fights crime with them.

Above all, through freedom, our people wanted a government that cared about restoring the dignity of all our people and for all to be equal citizens.

With all the progress, too many of our people still live in poverty. Too many of our people are victims of crime, too many young people cannot find jobs, too many women are suffering gender-based abuse and too many children are violated even in their own homes and in their communities.

Today as we celebrate 13 years of freedom we must commit to a joint effort to make South Africa the great nation it is. In 13 years we have done great things that show that together we can build a strong and a caring nation.

As we go forward we have to commit to:
* Peace, stability and safety in all parts of South Africa.
* We have to commit to access to justice for the poor.
* We have to ensure we make every young South African a dreamer with a vision and passion to serve, to be proud to serve.
* We have to commit to defeat poverty and use the resources at our disposal to reach all our poor people especially:

a. the child headed household
b. the pensioners
c. the disabled in all our communities.

Already an impressive 12 million people benefit from the state support through social grants.

We need a plan to empower our young people many of whom have limited experience and limited education.

Africa and South Africa have a young population and that is our future and strength. With so many young citizens we can build a stronger nation and the time is now.

Our biggest test now is how we change the lives of the millions of our people who have less education and give them better chances to survive, the future and to share in the growth now. Our young people are 70% of the unemployed and are the ones with whom to share our growth. We have to do this soon and reach out to them and include them in our plans. We cannot have a plan that has no plans for 70% of the unemployed who are at the prime of their age.

This government, nationally, provincially and locally plus private sector and civil society, must have a comprehensive job creation strategy for the unskilled so that we can use the people we have now much better.

We have to shift from over-planning for people we wish to have. The economy and democracy must be shared now, in the first instance, with those who cannot and we never make it if we do not target them and are not going to be highly skilled tomorrow. Those even with their 12 years and less of schooling can be made productive if we plan and target them better and provide life long and work based training.

We must of course continue to invest in creating the people with skills we need and want to have in the future but never at the expense of those who are more than 10 million destined for poverty, even though they are young strong and trainable. Many will never work until they are 40 not unless we do something all of us and we do it fast.

Everybody counts in this challenge of making South Africa a winning and caring nation:

* Let us fight against corrupt officials and politicians together.
* Let us eradicate the bucket system in all our communities in 2007.
* Let's work to bring water to all our people in 2010.
* We want electricity for all our people by 2012.
* We want more young people to pass matric in higher grade.
* We want every school to work as a place to learn and teach.

These are some practical things we must achieve. In 2010 this province will host one of the exciting soccer matches. The world chose us to host this great event because we have a proven track record and are trusted to do a good job and so will have to be at our best. Before 1994 South Africa was not part of FIFA and the soccer family of the world because of apartheid and to rejoin we were given a task to liberate South Africa and usher democracy and we did it, that was 27 April 1994, you did it then we rejoined world soccer because of you and we went on to bid to host the FIFA games (we won). You did it!

Now that we have won we must do even more, for all our people and future generations.

We have chosen to leave behind from 2010 a legacy:

* Much better sports capacity, more trained players and sports administrators.
* We are building and will have much improved public transport, rail, road, trains, busses, taxis, ports, airports that will improve our country.
* World class sports infrastructure stadiums to serve future generations. It will make us a great sporting destination for ever.
* We will showcase South Africa and Africa's beauty and attract tourists and create jobs.
* We have support from all over the world by security forces of so many nation who will support us to make it very safe and to work with our security.
* We will even try to win the cup.

If we work together we can only win together against poverty we can together make Chris Hani proud! Moroka proud! Luthuli proud! MaNgoyi proud and Biko proud build a better life for all. Happy Freedom Day!

I thank you!

Issued by: The Presidency
27 April 2007