Issued by: Office of Deputy President
3 May 1999
The Deputy President keeps up the pressure of the government's Anti-Corruption Campaign with the start of his visits to the provinces tomorrow, 4 May 1999, with a visit to key institutions in Gauteng. Mbeki will be accompanied by Ministers, Sydney Mufamadi and Valli Moosa, the Gauteng MEC for Safety and Security, and the MEC for Health, the national and provincial commissioners of police as well as the area commander.
This is the first of three visits to the provinces with the specific intention of placing corruption and service within the public service high on the public agenda. The Deputy President will be listening to the experiences, concerns and wishes of the people with the intention of obtaining a first hand impression of the problem of corruption and to assess for himself the quality of service in the police, the justice system and local authorities. The Deputy President will visit Kwazulu-Natal on the 7th May and Western Cape on the 16th May.
This campaign builds upon the foundations of the legal and constitutional framework and partnerships built over the past few years and comes hard on the heels of recent high profile actions of the government to combat corruption, such as the Anti-Corruption Summit held in Parliament in April this year and the Public Sector Anti-Corruption Summit of November 1998. Deputy President Mbeki has indicated that fighting crime and corruption will be a key focus of his administration should he become President.
The Deputy President is more than aware of the costs to the country of corruption both in regard to building the economy and to achieving the aims of social transformation. The aims of the government such as with regard to social transformation will not be jeopardised by those intent on stealing from the people. Mbeki wants to send out the strong message that corruption will be fought at every turn and his visits to selected provinces underscores his intention to keep up the pressure in the anti-corruption campaign.
In addition the Deputy President would like to hear from people whether the organs of state are serving the people in accordance with government policy of a people oriented service and the motto of Batho Pele. Together with fighting crime and corruption, the Deputy President is intent on seeing quality service being delivered to the people. Through his in-situ visits, Mbeki, wants to emphasise the importance of rebuilding the machinery of government to ensure that the civil service is inspired by a new ethos of service to the people. The Deputy President believes that if efficiency, effectiveness and delivery are too become the watchwords of all government departments and at all levels of government, it is important that he is seen to be monitoring the levels of service on the ground.
The Deputy President is of the opinion that these issues are of national importance and should be removed from the level of party-political pointscoring.
Nazeem Mahatey (Director: Communications: Office of the Deputy President 012 337 5142)