Remarks by North West Premier Edna Molewa during the NCOP debate on transformation for a better life for all, Stellenbosch

Chairperson of the National Council of Provinces
President of the Republic of South Africa
Ministers and Premiers
Honourable Members of the National Council of Provinces
Honoured guests
Ladies and gentlemen

The journey we began in 1994 is steadily, but surely, taking us to the promised land! Over the last thirteen years, we have been able to lay a foundation for a future that is qualitatively better than our ugly past.

Chairperson, I stand here before you satisfied that as a country and province, we have made massive strides in our effort to expand access to a better life for all. As a result of our work in the past few years, we are today able to say boldly that, despite the many challenges that remain, we are succeeding in bringing dignity to the majority of our people.

When we took over in 1994, we set for ourselves an objective of building a caring society that will deliver access to a better life for all. We committed ourselves to working tirelessly towards the noble objective of eradicating the legacy of apartheid and colonialism in our country.

At this occasion, we must remind ourselves about the pledge we made during our struggle for liberation that we will not consider our mission complete and our freedom achieved, unless all our people are freed from poverty, disease, homelessness and indignity.

Today we can reflect on the fruits of our work with a measure of pride. The recent community survey results reiterates the story we have been telling over the last few years - that acting together, we have made decisive advances over the past thirteen years in expanding access to a better life for all. In the North West, we continue to register good progress in our effort to broaden access to basic services such as water, electricity and sanitation.

Amongst other things, the survey tells us that the percentage of households using electricity for lighting in the North West has increased from 43,3% in 1996 to a staggering 82,3% in 2007. This tells us that for many of our people, today is better than yesterday and tomorrow looks even brighter!

On this day, we are therefore justified to say that, as a nation we have come a long way. We are justified to say that our efforts to build a better society have yielded positive results.

Over the last two weeks, I have been to the length and breadth of our province during the Imbizo Focus Week programme. I have seen and interacted with many people, in Madibogopan in Ngaka Modiri Molema District, Maquassi Hills in Kenneth Kaunda District, Modderspruit in Bojanala District and Bloemhof in Bophirima. I have seen their tears and faces that tell a story of a province at work to deliver a better life for all.

Theirs is a story of pain that co-exists with remarkable hope and patience. What is most striking about them is their confidence in our democracy and their enduring hope that tomorrow will be better than today and yesterday. They cling tenaciously to the hope that their human dignity will one day be restored and that today's pain is steadily giving way to a brighter tomorrow.

Throughout the imbizo programme, people express appreciation of the progress made by government to improve their lives. This appreciation is expressed alongside concerns at the pace and quality of delivering services. There is also recognition that while basic services have reached millions, there are many who still need them.

During the first few years of the imbizo programme, the most pressing issues for our people in the North West related to access to social services, particularly social grants. From 2004, the trend was moving away from social grants to issues relating to access to economic opportunities as well as concerns about the performance of government officials.

This may mean that government has been able to adequately communicate the issues around social grants and to improve the grants payment system. It may also mean that the President's message of calling on people to be their own liberators has been taken to heart by our people. They now want to seize the opportunities brought by our democracy.

We must constantly remind ourselves that the struggle for liberation was a struggle for political and economic emancipation of all our people. Today, we must lead a struggle to unleash the full economic potential of our land, its people and resources. Let us continue to create opportunities for all our people so that they, too, can have the possibility of creating a better life for themselves and their fellow citizens.

On this day, we must remind ourselves of the progress we have made in ensuring that we do not betray the cause for which many of our heroes and heroines laid down their lives during the struggle for liberation. We owe it to the fallen heroes and heroines of our struggle to continue transforming our society in line with our vision as articulated in our Constitution and the Freedom Charter.

As a result of the transformation agenda we initiated thirteen years ago, ours is now a society that is characterised by a fundamental and a decisive break with the past. It is a society that guarantees dignity and prosperity to all South Africans. It is this vision that forms the basis of our approach as we seek to transform the South African society.

Today, we can say with confidence that out of the womb of an unjust and inhuman society has emerged a new society that responds to the plight and aspirations of its people. However, we remain mindful that more work still needs to be done. We must therefore continue to intensify our efforts to ensure equal access to opportunities brought by democracy and freedom.

While we take pride in our achievements so far, we must harbour no illusions. We are aware that the task of banishing poverty and expanding access to a better life for all is far from achieved. But we remain confident that acting together, and sparing neither strength nor effort, this task cannot insurmountable.

I thank you

Issued by: North West Provincial Government
2 November 2007