Date: 21/03/2005
Source: Gauteng Provincial Government
Title: Shilowa: Human Rights Day celebrations
Address by Gauteng Premier Mbhazima Shilowa at the Human Rights Day commemoration, Sharpeville
Executive Mayors
Members of the Executive Council
Members of the Mayoral Committee
The people of Sharpeville
Comrades and friends
The massacre which took place in Sharpeville on 21 March 1960 was a brutal reminder of the depravity of the apartheid government, its callous disregard for human life and the extent to which it was prepared to go to defend white minority rule.
Sharpeville was a beginning and an end. It was the culmination of a phase of peaceful resistance which saw the masses of our people across the country stand together to oppose the system of apartheid. And it was the beginning of a new phase of struggle which saw the initiation of armed struggle and a greater emphasis on international mobilization to complement the struggles of our people to defeat the system of apartheid.
The people who were killed by apartheid police at Sharpeville 45 years ago were among many who had gathered to protest against the pass laws. It was these hated pass laws which sought to banish our people to the Bantustans. African people were allowed to come into the urban areas and centres of economic growth only as "hewers of wood and drawers of water". Those who didn't have passes or whose passes were not to the liking of the apartheid police were thrown into jail. This was the system of influx control, which was one of the cornerstones of the apartheid system, which sought to deny black people their birthright and valued their existence only as pools of cheap labour for the mines, factories and kitchens of the white minority.
To commemorate and pay tribute to those who laid down their lives for our freedom we declared 21 March Human Rights Day. On this day we also remember the dark past from which we emerged victorious to give birth to our new nation and rededicate ourselves to continue to protect and advance the human rights that we have won and pledge to continue to strive for human rights for all.
This year is also the 50th anniversary of the Freedom Charter, which is also a charter of human rights and which is one of the founding documents of our democracy, which laid the basis for the Reconstruction and Development Programme and our Constitution.
The vision articulated in the Freedom Charter inspired many generations in the struggle for a non-racial, non-sexist and democratic South Africa. Today, more than ten years since we attained our freedom, it remains a living document. It remains a people's manifesto which captures the aspirations of all our people and guides us as we continue, through our daily actions, to create a new Gauteng and a new South Africa as envisioned by our forebears.
In April last year the overwhelming majority of our people one again reaffirmed the correctness of this vision. They gave us a clear mandate on what we must continue to do to eradicate the legacy of racism, sexism, colonialism and apartheid and how to proceed in our mission to create a better life for all South Africa's people.
Based on this overwhelming mandate from the people, in Gauteng we developed a five year strategic plan which is our roadmap to achieve this vision of a better future. The key priorities which we committed ourselves to work tirelessly with the people of Gauteng to achieve are the following, to:
* Stimulate faster economic growth and drastically reduce unemployment
* Fight poverty and build secure and sustainable communities
* Develop healthy, appropriately skilled and productive people
* Deepen democracy and nation building and realise the constitutional rights of all the people and
* Build an effective and caring government.
The effective implementation of our five year programme will take us closer to the realization of the Freedom Charter's ideals in the second decade of freedom. While we have made significant progress in the first decade of democracy, we are challenged to intensify our efforts to ensure the full realization of the Freedom Charter's goals. The full achievement of these goals will be a fitting tribute to those who were killed in Sharpeville 45 years ago and others who laid down their lives in pursuit of freedom. Let this be the legacy which we will leave for future generations.
The people shall govern
In making the Freedom Charter a living reality, we reaffirm our commitment to ensuring that "The people shall govern".
The Freedom Charter says that "only a democratic state based on the will of all the people can secure to all their birthright".
Today we can take pride in our democracy and in the democratic, people-centred, developmental state and institutions of democracy that we have built in just ten years.
Our challenge is to deepen democracy through strengthening local government and organs of public participation such as ward committees, school governing bodies and community policing forums at a local level.
We need to improve the capacity of the state to better serve the people as well as to involve all our people, in the words of the Freedom Charter, "in the administration of the country".
We need to build a public service that is accountable to the people and that truly serves them. In the next year we will revitalize the Batho Pele campaign to improve service delivery, make the public service more responsive to the needs of the people and set minimum service standards.
In further entrenching our democracy and ensuring that the people indeed govern, we need to empower every person who is entitled to vote to participate in the local government elections. We must increase awareness of the rights and responsibilities of citizens as well as reinforce voter education and the ID and voter registration campaign.
Over the past five years the Izimbizo have become a powerful way to directly involve our people in governance on an ongoing basis. In this year we will take the Gauteng imbizo to over 70 communities in Gauteng to give residents an opportunity to make direct inputs into government's programmes.
The people shall share in the country's wealth
The Freedom Charter says, "The people shall share in the country's wealth", "The land shall be shared among those who work it" and "There shall be work and security".
In realizing these goals we need to continue to move away from a situation in which the economy is in the hands of a minority. All the people must be able to participate in and benefit from economic growth.
Implementing a broad-based black economic empowerment strategy is key in improving the participation of those previously excluded from the economy, especially black people, women and people with disabilities. Our strategy aims to ensure that, by 2009, between 60% and 70% of government procurement goes to broad-based black economically empowered companies.
In April, we will launch a new agency to give financial and non-financial support to small, medium and micro enterprises (SMME). Through SMMEs, many more of our people will have an opportunity to enter the mainstream of the economy.
We are putting in place a strategy to make Gauteng a globally competitive city region in the next ten years. This will help to direct public and private sector resources towards a common goal and put us in a stronger position to more effectively tackle unemployment and poverty.
We have developed a Growth and Development Strategy which will target sectors such as smart industries, tourism and agriculture, which have potential to grow more and create more jobs. Maximising the use of agricultural land and increased support for emerging black farmers will also be a priority.
Over the next three years we will invest over R17 billion in economic and social infrastructures including roads, schools, clinics and housing. This will help to spread wealth by putting more assets in the hands of our people, improving communities and contributing to economic growth.
In the next five years local and provincial government will combine resources to pave all untarred streets in 20 established townships and build commercial hubs at taxi ranks.
In contributing to the national goal of one million work opportunities we will implement the Expanded Public Works Programme and increase the labour content of these programmes.
All shall be equal before the law
While apartheid South Africa was based on the oppression of black people by the white minority, the Freedom Charter envisaged a non-racial society in which "All national groups shall have equal rights", "All shall enjoy equal human rights" and "All shall be equal before the law".
These principles are enshrined in our democratic Constitution and we have put in place laws to outlaw discrimination on the basis of race, gender, religion, disability and other unfair discrimination.
While we have made important inroads, the legacy of discrimination and oppression remains. Poverty and unemployment continues to affect black people the worst, particularly black women. Our challenge is to continue to take active steps to eradicate this legacy and ensure that the rights envisioned in the Freedom Charter and our Constitution become a living reality.
In particular we will focus on the rights of women, the elderly, youth, children and people with disabilities.
The doors of learning and culture shall be opened
While apartheid sought to suppress our cultural heritage and deny black people access to education and skills, the Freedom Charter said, "The doors of learning and culture shall be opened".
It envisaged an education system where the "aim of education shall be to teach the youth to love their people and their culture, to honour human brotherhood, liberty and peace".
We have made strides in ensuring that every child has access to better quality education and we are putting in place plans to improve the quality of that education. We are focusing on improving maths, science and technology education and giving learners in every public school access to computers and the internet. These are especially important to provide the skills needed to grow the economy.
In Gauteng we face the challenge of accommodating growing numbers of learners, including those in new settlements and those who come from other provinces. We are building more schools and classrooms to accommodate all our learners, including the greater number of learners who are staying at school beyond grade.
There shall be houses, security and comfort
The Freedom Charter says, "There shall be houses, security and comfort". It says all people shall have the right to live where they choose, be decently houses, and to bring up their families in comfort and security.
It also speaks about free health care, especially for mothers and young children, that no-one shall go hungry, that slums shall be demolished and new suburbs built where all have transport, roads, lighting, playing fields, cr
Source: Gauteng Provincial Government
Title: Shilowa: Human Rights Day celebrations
Address by Gauteng Premier Mbhazima Shilowa at the Human Rights Day commemoration, Sharpeville
Executive Mayors
Members of the Executive Council
Members of the Mayoral Committee
The people of Sharpeville
Comrades and friends
The massacre which took place in Sharpeville on 21 March 1960 was a brutal reminder of the depravity of the apartheid government, its callous disregard for human life and the extent to which it was prepared to go to defend white minority rule.
Sharpeville was a beginning and an end. It was the culmination of a phase of peaceful resistance which saw the masses of our people across the country stand together to oppose the system of apartheid. And it was the beginning of a new phase of struggle which saw the initiation of armed struggle and a greater emphasis on international mobilization to complement the struggles of our people to defeat the system of apartheid.
The people who were killed by apartheid police at Sharpeville 45 years ago were among many who had gathered to protest against the pass laws. It was these hated pass laws which sought to banish our people to the Bantustans. African people were allowed to come into the urban areas and centres of economic growth only as "hewers of wood and drawers of water". Those who didn't have passes or whose passes were not to the liking of the apartheid police were thrown into jail. This was the system of influx control, which was one of the cornerstones of the apartheid system, which sought to deny black people their birthright and valued their existence only as pools of cheap labour for the mines, factories and kitchens of the white minority.
To commemorate and pay tribute to those who laid down their lives for our freedom we declared 21 March Human Rights Day. On this day we also remember the dark past from which we emerged victorious to give birth to our new nation and rededicate ourselves to continue to protect and advance the human rights that we have won and pledge to continue to strive for human rights for all.
This year is also the 50th anniversary of the Freedom Charter, which is also a charter of human rights and which is one of the founding documents of our democracy, which laid the basis for the Reconstruction and Development Programme and our Constitution.
The vision articulated in the Freedom Charter inspired many generations in the struggle for a non-racial, non-sexist and democratic South Africa. Today, more than ten years since we attained our freedom, it remains a living document. It remains a people's manifesto which captures the aspirations of all our people and guides us as we continue, through our daily actions, to create a new Gauteng and a new South Africa as envisioned by our forebears.
In April last year the overwhelming majority of our people one again reaffirmed the correctness of this vision. They gave us a clear mandate on what we must continue to do to eradicate the legacy of racism, sexism, colonialism and apartheid and how to proceed in our mission to create a better life for all South Africa's people.
Based on this overwhelming mandate from the people, in Gauteng we developed a five year strategic plan which is our roadmap to achieve this vision of a better future. The key priorities which we committed ourselves to work tirelessly with the people of Gauteng to achieve are the following, to:
* Stimulate faster economic growth and drastically reduce unemployment
* Fight poverty and build secure and sustainable communities
* Develop healthy, appropriately skilled and productive people
* Deepen democracy and nation building and realise the constitutional rights of all the people and
* Build an effective and caring government.
The effective implementation of our five year programme will take us closer to the realization of the Freedom Charter's ideals in the second decade of freedom. While we have made significant progress in the first decade of democracy, we are challenged to intensify our efforts to ensure the full realization of the Freedom Charter's goals. The full achievement of these goals will be a fitting tribute to those who were killed in Sharpeville 45 years ago and others who laid down their lives in pursuit of freedom. Let this be the legacy which we will leave for future generations.
The people shall govern
In making the Freedom Charter a living reality, we reaffirm our commitment to ensuring that "The people shall govern".
The Freedom Charter says that "only a democratic state based on the will of all the people can secure to all their birthright".
Today we can take pride in our democracy and in the democratic, people-centred, developmental state and institutions of democracy that we have built in just ten years.
Our challenge is to deepen democracy through strengthening local government and organs of public participation such as ward committees, school governing bodies and community policing forums at a local level.
We need to improve the capacity of the state to better serve the people as well as to involve all our people, in the words of the Freedom Charter, "in the administration of the country".
We need to build a public service that is accountable to the people and that truly serves them. In the next year we will revitalize the Batho Pele campaign to improve service delivery, make the public service more responsive to the needs of the people and set minimum service standards.
In further entrenching our democracy and ensuring that the people indeed govern, we need to empower every person who is entitled to vote to participate in the local government elections. We must increase awareness of the rights and responsibilities of citizens as well as reinforce voter education and the ID and voter registration campaign.
Over the past five years the Izimbizo have become a powerful way to directly involve our people in governance on an ongoing basis. In this year we will take the Gauteng imbizo to over 70 communities in Gauteng to give residents an opportunity to make direct inputs into government's programmes.
The people shall share in the country's wealth
The Freedom Charter says, "The people shall share in the country's wealth", "The land shall be shared among those who work it" and "There shall be work and security".
In realizing these goals we need to continue to move away from a situation in which the economy is in the hands of a minority. All the people must be able to participate in and benefit from economic growth.
Implementing a broad-based black economic empowerment strategy is key in improving the participation of those previously excluded from the economy, especially black people, women and people with disabilities. Our strategy aims to ensure that, by 2009, between 60% and 70% of government procurement goes to broad-based black economically empowered companies.
In April, we will launch a new agency to give financial and non-financial support to small, medium and micro enterprises (SMME). Through SMMEs, many more of our people will have an opportunity to enter the mainstream of the economy.
We are putting in place a strategy to make Gauteng a globally competitive city region in the next ten years. This will help to direct public and private sector resources towards a common goal and put us in a stronger position to more effectively tackle unemployment and poverty.
We have developed a Growth and Development Strategy which will target sectors such as smart industries, tourism and agriculture, which have potential to grow more and create more jobs. Maximising the use of agricultural land and increased support for emerging black farmers will also be a priority.
Over the next three years we will invest over R17 billion in economic and social infrastructures including roads, schools, clinics and housing. This will help to spread wealth by putting more assets in the hands of our people, improving communities and contributing to economic growth.
In the next five years local and provincial government will combine resources to pave all untarred streets in 20 established townships and build commercial hubs at taxi ranks.
In contributing to the national goal of one million work opportunities we will implement the Expanded Public Works Programme and increase the labour content of these programmes.
All shall be equal before the law
While apartheid South Africa was based on the oppression of black people by the white minority, the Freedom Charter envisaged a non-racial society in which "All national groups shall have equal rights", "All shall enjoy equal human rights" and "All shall be equal before the law".
These principles are enshrined in our democratic Constitution and we have put in place laws to outlaw discrimination on the basis of race, gender, religion, disability and other unfair discrimination.
While we have made important inroads, the legacy of discrimination and oppression remains. Poverty and unemployment continues to affect black people the worst, particularly black women. Our challenge is to continue to take active steps to eradicate this legacy and ensure that the rights envisioned in the Freedom Charter and our Constitution become a living reality.
In particular we will focus on the rights of women, the elderly, youth, children and people with disabilities.
The doors of learning and culture shall be opened
While apartheid sought to suppress our cultural heritage and deny black people access to education and skills, the Freedom Charter said, "The doors of learning and culture shall be opened".
It envisaged an education system where the "aim of education shall be to teach the youth to love their people and their culture, to honour human brotherhood, liberty and peace".
We have made strides in ensuring that every child has access to better quality education and we are putting in place plans to improve the quality of that education. We are focusing on improving maths, science and technology education and giving learners in every public school access to computers and the internet. These are especially important to provide the skills needed to grow the economy.
In Gauteng we face the challenge of accommodating growing numbers of learners, including those in new settlements and those who come from other provinces. We are building more schools and classrooms to accommodate all our learners, including the greater number of learners who are staying at school beyond grade.
There shall be houses, security and comfort
The Freedom Charter says, "There shall be houses, security and comfort". It says all people shall have the right to live where they choose, be decently houses, and to bring up their families in comfort and security.
It also speaks about free health care, especially for mothers and young children, that no-one shall go hungry, that slums shall be demolished and new suburbs built where all have transport, roads, lighting, playing fields, cr
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