Date: 31/10/2005
Source: Limpopo Provincial Government
Title: Moloto: Opening of the National Council of Provinces
Address by the Premier of Limpopo, Mr Sello Moloto, at the opening of the National Council of Provinces (NCOP), Tivumbeni Multi-purpose Community Centre, Mopani District, Nkowakowa, Limpopo
Programme director
Chairperson of the NCOP, Mr MJ Mahlangu
Honourable Deputy Chairperson of the NCOP, Ms Peggy Hollander
Speaker of our Legislature and other Speakers
Deputy Speakers
MECs
Members of Parliament and NCOP members
Leaders of Political parties
Executive Mayor of Mopani and other Executive Mayors
Mayor of Greater Tzaneen Municipality Councillors
Chairperson of the House of Traditional Leaders and other Traditional Leaders
Distinguished guests
Ladies and gentlemen
It is indeed a great pleasure to welcome you to Limpopo on behalf of millions of South Africans who live in this Province. We are sure that you will agree with us that the area in which you are is like no other in South Africa, both in terms of its uniqueness and natural beauty. Those like me who came by road to this place would have noticed the spectacular rolling landscapes and breathtaking sceneries which make this part of our Province a true tropical paradise of South Africa. We would highly appreciate that you could find time from within your busy schedules to come back to this area and the province to further explore the beauty of this majestic land. The people and government of Limpopo are truly excited to play host to this all important sitting of the people’s parliament in our country. It is indeed our pleasure to welcome hundreds of you to this historical gathering in this part of our land.
The National Council of Provinces (NCOP) is a very important institution in our democracy. Apart from its regular law-making and oversight function, it also serves as a microcosm of local, provincial and national interests of government. This sitting in our Province provides a rare opportunity for sharing of best practices and insight on service delivery and inter-governmental practice. As you may well know, the next few days will also provide a space for members of the House to directly interact with ordinary people. We urge you to pay attention and listen attentively to what ordinary people have to say about issues that directly affect their lives.
In our assessment of service delivery through travelling the length and breadth of the Province, engaging in such outreach programmes as Exco meets the people, Batho Pele road shows and government Imbizos we continue to hear that the biggest enemies of our people are poverty and unemployment. These challenges are further compounded by lack of basic infrastructure developments such as access roads, electricity, and water shortage. It cannot be denied that poverty in South Africa, like elsewhere in the world, has a race, age, geographic and gender dimension. It is a common fact that poverty and high unemployment rates are to be found largely amongst Africans, those who live in rural areas, and among women and the youth.
While there is also significant number of the urban poor or the working poor in our towns and cities, it cannot be denied that high levels of poverty prevail mostly in outlying areas, particularly in farms. Farm-workers constitute by far the poorest section of the employed working-force in our country. This is despite the positive policy improvements made by government regarding their wages and conditions of living. There is obviously a need that we hasten all efforts aimed at improving the livelihoods of this community. Despite the introduction of ESTA (Extension of Security of Tenure Act) and Labour Tenants Act, farm evictions continue and the human rights of farm workers continue to be infringed. Many farm workers are denied of basic services such as housing, schools, electricity, medical facilities and transport.
Social security
Top on the agenda of this government is the protection of the rights of those most vulnerable in our society. These include, women, children, the elderly and the disabled. It is important to note that the success of our developmental state would also be evaluated by the extent to which we value the contribution of this section of our population. It is an encouraging fact that our government has created offices in Premier’s offices and in the Presidency to look specifically into concerns of these communities.
It is therefore incumbent upon all social partners including civil society to strengthen other mechanisms that have been put in place by government to address the abuse of children, women, the elderly and the disabled.
Our social security system compares with the best in the world. As government, we continue to spend close to 90% of Social Development budget on social security. This takes the form of old age pensions, disability and child support grants including social relief interventions. Social security grants remain the most direct intervention in our fight against poverty. In Limpopo we can safely say that we have gone a long way in improving the accessibility of these social grants, though challenges of integrity and efficiency in the system remain. The challenge of integrity and efficiency is endemic throughout the country hence the Department of Social Development initiated an indemnity process early this year to weed out ghost pensioners. We take pride in the success of this initiative which saw millions of state money being saved through the campaign. We believe the newly established South African Social Security Agency would build on the successes of this campaign.
Land reform
Another challenge which we are contending with in the province is the issue of land claims. About 80%, to be precise 88% of the province’s productive land is under land claims. As a provincial government we are concerned about the snail pace of the resolution of this impasse. We have already made our input and suggestions to the National Land Summit which was convened in July. We hope that the department is obviously attending to the bottlenecks.
Health
Our primary healthcare system is gradually improving for the better. We are also not naive to the reality that a sustainable health care system we envisage is partially determined by a wide range of other factors including proper housing, sanitation, access to safe drinking water and effective and efficient public transport system. In recent times, we have begun to hear reports of outbreaks of specific waterborne diseases in certain parts of our country as a result of poor sanitation and lack of clean potable water. This undoubtedly calls for closer working cooperation between water authorities, local municipalities and the Department of health.
The prevalence rate of HIV and AIDS infections amongst our people remain another source of great worry. Whilst researchers and scientists continue to work hard to find a cure for the disease, our people must exercise greater care and responsibility as individuals and collectively towards the pandemic. On our part, as government, we must insist on our prevention message of abstinence, faithfulness and condom usage. Equally we must hasten efforts to increase the number of accredited sites for the continuous roll-out of the comprehensive management and treatment plan.
Provision of water
Generally speaking, South Africa is regarded as a semi-arid country in the world. This means that we do not experience good rainfalls that build up sufficient water levels for both domestic and commercial use. As you may well know, most of Limpopo is very dry and rain starved. We hope the few days that members of the House will spend in this Province will awaken them to the reality of the ravaging drought in this part of our country. We believe that perhaps time has come for national government to declare parts of our province disaster areas. In cushioning the effects of this devastating drought and also addressing the service delivery backlogs which are confronting us, preparations are at an advanced stage to put a formal request for assistance in dealing with the drought from national government. We hope and trust that our request will be considered favourable. However, we do not dispute the fact that this could be the same reality in other parts of South Africa.
Since 1994, government has provided basic water supply to more than 1.3 million people. This is obviously a good record considering where we come from. However, there are still millions of our people who do not as yet have access to safe drinking water. In many of these communities, there is a water reticulation network which because of drought cannot provide water. The challenge we are faced with in our view, is the building of more dams and other water catchments areas. Equally important is the need to invest in water harvesting technologies and also heed the call for saving water through various conservation methods. On the other hand, the Water Act and the Water services Act continue to pose a serious challenge that requires us to jerk up the capacity of municipalities to effectively deliver and manage water services. We acknowledge the fact that without this capacity at Municipal level, our people would unnecessarily become vulnerable to preventable waterborne diseases, like cholera and typhoid.
We are sure that, if immediate solutions are not found to this challenge within the short to medium term, we may well undermine considerable progress achieved in other areas like primary health care, sanitation, housing and small, medium and micro enterprises (SMMEs) development in the last 11 years of our freedom and democracy.
Local governance
The province is seized with the implementation of Project Consolidate. Our involvement in this sphere of government has assisted in awakening us to the reality of the challenges which our nation still has to contend with. We have committed ourselves as the provincial government to support and intervene in our municipalities in order to jerk up their capacity to deliver the services they are required to deliver. We hold the view that our intervention and support must be precise and decisive since we have no luxury of time. Our people deserved better lives yesterday and therefore there is no moment to spare. We have just concluded our budget Lekgotla on Wednesday and we have decided to intervene in three areas; i.e. we have allocated R100 million for water and drought relief programme because the R30 million set aside for the assistance of farmers by the Department of Agriculture has been exhausted. We have also allocated another R100 million for electricity whilst another R100 million goes to the road infrastructure. A planning task team has been established in order to ensure that the intervention takes off. We think that this intervention will go a long way to address these challenges.
The “taking of parliament to the people” programme of the NCOP is precisely what we need to maintain closer and dynamic contact with our people. We congratulate NCOP for conceiving this idea which affirms people’s participation in their own governance.
In 1993, the Honourable President of the African National Congress (ANC), Cde Oliver Tambo, during his address to international delegates on the future of our country, had this to say about South Africa “We have it within our power, working together as fellow South Africans, to transform this land into a land of plenty for all”
If these wise counsel and visionary advice has to be actualised, there is no doubt that South Africa would indeed remain a shining example.
I thank you.
Issued by: Office of the Premier, Limpopo Provincial Government
31 October 2005
Source: Limpopo Provincial Government
Title: Moloto: Opening of the National Council of Provinces
Address by the Premier of Limpopo, Mr Sello Moloto, at the opening of the National Council of Provinces (NCOP), Tivumbeni Multi-purpose Community Centre, Mopani District, Nkowakowa, Limpopo
Programme director
Chairperson of the NCOP, Mr MJ Mahlangu
Honourable Deputy Chairperson of the NCOP, Ms Peggy Hollander
Speaker of our Legislature and other Speakers
Deputy Speakers
MECs
Members of Parliament and NCOP members
Leaders of Political parties
Executive Mayor of Mopani and other Executive Mayors
Mayor of Greater Tzaneen Municipality Councillors
Chairperson of the House of Traditional Leaders and other Traditional Leaders
Distinguished guests
Ladies and gentlemen
It is indeed a great pleasure to welcome you to Limpopo on behalf of millions of South Africans who live in this Province. We are sure that you will agree with us that the area in which you are is like no other in South Africa, both in terms of its uniqueness and natural beauty. Those like me who came by road to this place would have noticed the spectacular rolling landscapes and breathtaking sceneries which make this part of our Province a true tropical paradise of South Africa. We would highly appreciate that you could find time from within your busy schedules to come back to this area and the province to further explore the beauty of this majestic land. The people and government of Limpopo are truly excited to play host to this all important sitting of the people’s parliament in our country. It is indeed our pleasure to welcome hundreds of you to this historical gathering in this part of our land.
The National Council of Provinces (NCOP) is a very important institution in our democracy. Apart from its regular law-making and oversight function, it also serves as a microcosm of local, provincial and national interests of government. This sitting in our Province provides a rare opportunity for sharing of best practices and insight on service delivery and inter-governmental practice. As you may well know, the next few days will also provide a space for members of the House to directly interact with ordinary people. We urge you to pay attention and listen attentively to what ordinary people have to say about issues that directly affect their lives.
In our assessment of service delivery through travelling the length and breadth of the Province, engaging in such outreach programmes as Exco meets the people, Batho Pele road shows and government Imbizos we continue to hear that the biggest enemies of our people are poverty and unemployment. These challenges are further compounded by lack of basic infrastructure developments such as access roads, electricity, and water shortage. It cannot be denied that poverty in South Africa, like elsewhere in the world, has a race, age, geographic and gender dimension. It is a common fact that poverty and high unemployment rates are to be found largely amongst Africans, those who live in rural areas, and among women and the youth.
While there is also significant number of the urban poor or the working poor in our towns and cities, it cannot be denied that high levels of poverty prevail mostly in outlying areas, particularly in farms. Farm-workers constitute by far the poorest section of the employed working-force in our country. This is despite the positive policy improvements made by government regarding their wages and conditions of living. There is obviously a need that we hasten all efforts aimed at improving the livelihoods of this community. Despite the introduction of ESTA (Extension of Security of Tenure Act) and Labour Tenants Act, farm evictions continue and the human rights of farm workers continue to be infringed. Many farm workers are denied of basic services such as housing, schools, electricity, medical facilities and transport.
Social security
Top on the agenda of this government is the protection of the rights of those most vulnerable in our society. These include, women, children, the elderly and the disabled. It is important to note that the success of our developmental state would also be evaluated by the extent to which we value the contribution of this section of our population. It is an encouraging fact that our government has created offices in Premier’s offices and in the Presidency to look specifically into concerns of these communities.
It is therefore incumbent upon all social partners including civil society to strengthen other mechanisms that have been put in place by government to address the abuse of children, women, the elderly and the disabled.
Our social security system compares with the best in the world. As government, we continue to spend close to 90% of Social Development budget on social security. This takes the form of old age pensions, disability and child support grants including social relief interventions. Social security grants remain the most direct intervention in our fight against poverty. In Limpopo we can safely say that we have gone a long way in improving the accessibility of these social grants, though challenges of integrity and efficiency in the system remain. The challenge of integrity and efficiency is endemic throughout the country hence the Department of Social Development initiated an indemnity process early this year to weed out ghost pensioners. We take pride in the success of this initiative which saw millions of state money being saved through the campaign. We believe the newly established South African Social Security Agency would build on the successes of this campaign.
Land reform
Another challenge which we are contending with in the province is the issue of land claims. About 80%, to be precise 88% of the province’s productive land is under land claims. As a provincial government we are concerned about the snail pace of the resolution of this impasse. We have already made our input and suggestions to the National Land Summit which was convened in July. We hope that the department is obviously attending to the bottlenecks.
Health
Our primary healthcare system is gradually improving for the better. We are also not naive to the reality that a sustainable health care system we envisage is partially determined by a wide range of other factors including proper housing, sanitation, access to safe drinking water and effective and efficient public transport system. In recent times, we have begun to hear reports of outbreaks of specific waterborne diseases in certain parts of our country as a result of poor sanitation and lack of clean potable water. This undoubtedly calls for closer working cooperation between water authorities, local municipalities and the Department of health.
The prevalence rate of HIV and AIDS infections amongst our people remain another source of great worry. Whilst researchers and scientists continue to work hard to find a cure for the disease, our people must exercise greater care and responsibility as individuals and collectively towards the pandemic. On our part, as government, we must insist on our prevention message of abstinence, faithfulness and condom usage. Equally we must hasten efforts to increase the number of accredited sites for the continuous roll-out of the comprehensive management and treatment plan.
Provision of water
Generally speaking, South Africa is regarded as a semi-arid country in the world. This means that we do not experience good rainfalls that build up sufficient water levels for both domestic and commercial use. As you may well know, most of Limpopo is very dry and rain starved. We hope the few days that members of the House will spend in this Province will awaken them to the reality of the ravaging drought in this part of our country. We believe that perhaps time has come for national government to declare parts of our province disaster areas. In cushioning the effects of this devastating drought and also addressing the service delivery backlogs which are confronting us, preparations are at an advanced stage to put a formal request for assistance in dealing with the drought from national government. We hope and trust that our request will be considered favourable. However, we do not dispute the fact that this could be the same reality in other parts of South Africa.
Since 1994, government has provided basic water supply to more than 1.3 million people. This is obviously a good record considering where we come from. However, there are still millions of our people who do not as yet have access to safe drinking water. In many of these communities, there is a water reticulation network which because of drought cannot provide water. The challenge we are faced with in our view, is the building of more dams and other water catchments areas. Equally important is the need to invest in water harvesting technologies and also heed the call for saving water through various conservation methods. On the other hand, the Water Act and the Water services Act continue to pose a serious challenge that requires us to jerk up the capacity of municipalities to effectively deliver and manage water services. We acknowledge the fact that without this capacity at Municipal level, our people would unnecessarily become vulnerable to preventable waterborne diseases, like cholera and typhoid.
We are sure that, if immediate solutions are not found to this challenge within the short to medium term, we may well undermine considerable progress achieved in other areas like primary health care, sanitation, housing and small, medium and micro enterprises (SMMEs) development in the last 11 years of our freedom and democracy.
Local governance
The province is seized with the implementation of Project Consolidate. Our involvement in this sphere of government has assisted in awakening us to the reality of the challenges which our nation still has to contend with. We have committed ourselves as the provincial government to support and intervene in our municipalities in order to jerk up their capacity to deliver the services they are required to deliver. We hold the view that our intervention and support must be precise and decisive since we have no luxury of time. Our people deserved better lives yesterday and therefore there is no moment to spare. We have just concluded our budget Lekgotla on Wednesday and we have decided to intervene in three areas; i.e. we have allocated R100 million for water and drought relief programme because the R30 million set aside for the assistance of farmers by the Department of Agriculture has been exhausted. We have also allocated another R100 million for electricity whilst another R100 million goes to the road infrastructure. A planning task team has been established in order to ensure that the intervention takes off. We think that this intervention will go a long way to address these challenges.
The “taking of parliament to the people” programme of the NCOP is precisely what we need to maintain closer and dynamic contact with our people. We congratulate NCOP for conceiving this idea which affirms people’s participation in their own governance.
In 1993, the Honourable President of the African National Congress (ANC), Cde Oliver Tambo, during his address to international delegates on the future of our country, had this to say about South Africa “We have it within our power, working together as fellow South Africans, to transform this land into a land of plenty for all”
If these wise counsel and visionary advice has to be actualised, there is no doubt that South Africa would indeed remain a shining example.
I thank you.
Issued by: Office of the Premier, Limpopo Provincial Government
31 October 2005
Advertisement
EMAIL THIS ARTICLE SAVE THIS ARTICLE FEEDBACK
To subscribe email subscriptions@creamermedia.co.za or click here
To advertise email advertising@creamermedia.co.za or click here
