Issued by: Ministry of Sport and Recreation,
National Assembly, 29 May 2001
"THE ROLE OF SPORT AND RECREATION IN BUILDING A NATION UNITED IN ACTION FOR CHANGE"
Madam Speaker,
It is indeed an honour to address this august House in this my second budget speech as Minister of Sport and Recreation. Much has happened over the past year and it is hard to believe that twelve months have already passed since I addressed you from this podium.
Allow me, first of all, to deviate from my core business here this afternoon by drawing your attention to the presence in the House of several of my colleagues from different countries, along with their senior officials and other dignitaries, who are in South Africa to attend the meetings of the International Intergovernmental Consultative Group on Anti-Doping in Sport (IICGADS), and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). I would like to welcome them warmly to our country, as well as to Parliament this afternoon. We are proud to host the IIGCADS and WADA meetings and trust that your brief sojourn in South Africa will be enjoyable and fruitful, and that you will return home as good ambassadors of our wonderful country. I trust also that the work that you will be doing here will go a long way to rid sport of one of the greatest threats that faces its continued existence in its present form. Of course, we cannot allow doping to prevail, for humankind will be robbed of one of its greatest assets, sport, should we not succeed in combating this evil. I would also like to welcome to Parliament CEOs, presidents of national and provincial sports federations, captains of teams and individual sportspersons who are in the gallery this afternoon. I am happy to see that you are interested in witnessing first-hand, how we are fighting your cause in government.
Madam Speaker,
My address here today will relate primarily to sports' contribution to the Policy Thrusts identified by the President during his speech at the Opening of Parliament in February of this year, and especially in his reference to "Building a Nation United in Action for Change". In this regard, I shall be focusing on the role of sport and recreation in addressing this objective for I believe that we are ideally located to play a significant part in this context.
I am sure that nobody needs to be reminded of the potential role of sport in nation building. Indeed, we often lament the lost chances of the 1995 Rugby World Cup in helping to cement our fledgling democracy. I would want to believe that we have made sufficient progress since then to harness sport's full potential in that regard. The fact that the rugby test on June 16 between the Springboks and the French National Team at Ellis Park will constitute part of the Youth Day Celebrations, is clear testimony that we have made significant progress toward unity and, indeed, toward transformation. SAFA will also host a match in Durban on 17 June as part of the Youth Day celebrations and the players will be visiting Umlazi as part of the event. I would like to congratulate SARFU and SAFA on their commitment to Youth Day and I trust that the rugby and soccer loving public will buy into that positive development.
I have no illusions that if sport and recreation can serve as a medium for change, it can just as easily serve to maintain the status quo. Allow me to say unequivocally therefore, Madam Speaker, that I shall be uncompromising in the coming year to ensure that sport serves as an agent of change in our country. I shall challenge any sports federation that undermines my efforts in this regard, relentlessly. You will recall that at one stage sport was the leading protagonist in this country for change. I am sorry to say that we have lost that advantage and would like to give notice that I am committed to turning that trend around. During the course of 2000, several of the major sports federations set targets for achieving representivity in their representative teams. I shall be examining their performances in the near future. New targets will have to be set to ensure that we proceed progressively and rapidly toward our goal of total representivity in line with the demographics of the country, an objective to which I am committed. I shall be engaging all the National Federations shortly with a view to measuring their performances and to extract from them new commitments for the year ahead. Moreover, I shall not only be focusing on the major federations as I have done up till now, I shall also be engaging the smaller ones with a view to setting similar targets to which I shall hold them accountable and use any means at my disposal to ensure compliance.
Transformation in sport involves more than just the attainment of unity; I think that we have now passed that stage. It involves a paradigm shift in which non-racialism, democracy and representivity become fundamental principles that inform practice. I will no longer tolerate a situation in which conformity to only the minimum representivity conditions becomes the norm. The practice of replacing a black player in a team by another black player to meet these minimum criteria cannot be allowed to continue as standard practice. A representative team can comprise more than three black players even though we insist on this number as a minimum at the moment. The recent Super 12 series provided clear proof of the depth of black talent in rugby circles, for example. Any number of black players can qualify for a Springbok team and I wish to laud Harry Viljoen for having included seven blacks in the Springbok training camp. I trust that this will translate into a Springbok team that will see similar levels of representivity. Players of the calibre of Deon Kayser, Adrian Jacobs, Ricardo Laubscher and Wiley Human must surely be given opportunities now. I am impressed with SARFU's Vision 2003 document and will monitor their progress toward actualising the objectives set therein.
I want to issue a stern warning against the practice in certain federations, and they know who they are, that use the principle of democracy simplistically to exclude blacks from positions in their management structures. Democracy, in the South African sports context, is more than a simple numbers game. It is obvious that in terms of membership and number of clubs, whites will dominate. That relates to our history. When numbers are used to vote predominantly white executive committees into power, we have lost the spirit not only of transformation in South Africa, but also of reconciliation and non-racism. It is a facade that I will challenge vigorously.
I shall be hosting a conference on transformation in sport later this year and will spell out my intentions in this regard at that forum. I gave notice of this at the recent General Assembly of the Sports Commission, the parliament of South African sport and dare I say that I received large-scale support for that initiative. My Department will also host a colloquium at the World Anti-Racism Conference later this year in Durban, in which the question of racism in sport will receive prominence. We are hoping to involve some of the world's leading protagonists of non-racism in sport and our programme will feature a soccer match between a European U/23 team and a South African U/23 team under the banner of "Red-carding Racism in Sport". I trust that I will enjoy your support in these endeavours.
I have recently appointed a Ministerial Task Team to advise me on ways and means to improve the performances of our athletes and teams in international sports competitions. I am convinced that we can better our performances if we pool our scarce resources to prepare our athletes for participation in international competitions. It makes no sense to me, to have separate structures preparing the same athletes that participate in different international competitions. Such a practice, while being economically unsound, serves only to sow confusion amongst our athletes. We can ill-afford the luxury of this level of fragmentation. I am encouraged by the degree of consensus that has emerged in the preliminary report of the Task Team against such fragmentation. This bodes well for the preparation of our sports teams in future and I look forward to receiving the final report of the Task Team. In this context, I would like to applaud the efforts of Dr. Joe Phaahla and the members of the Task Team for the sterling work that they are doing. Their initial reflections on how to divide the scarce pool of resources available for sport and recreation are encouraging indeed. I can only concur that government and the private sector will have to work together if we are going to make any headway in international sport. Moreover, we will have to be sober in considering the manner in which we divide the relatively small resource pool between the many potential claimants for support. It is unrealistic to give specific or priority funding for high performance to all national federations. It is a recipe for mediocrity. We will have to prioritise and decide on supporting those sports more substantially that have a reasonable chance of bringing glory and honour to South Africa in the international arenas. I am not saying that we should not fund the other sports at all. Such a dispensation will fly in the face of my efforts at getting more people to participate in wholesome physical activity. I am referring rather, to our efforts to achieve success in high performance sport at the international level. We will have to set clear criteria for accessing resources in this category. Factors such as the profile of the sport within South Africa and abroad, its strategic importance to us as a country, our own performance in the sport internationally, the success of our national federations in involving women, rural communities and disadvantaged racial groups in their activities and other such considerations, will play a part. While I am convinced that the proposals of the Task Team will go a long way to improving the competitiveness of our sports teams, I would also like to appeal to the South African public to be realistic in their expectations, for we can never successfully challenge other countries whose funding in sport (and recreation) far outstrips ours.
Sport and Recreation South Africa and the Sports Commission have been hard at work in revising our funding policy, the major changes of which relate to the introduction of an outcomes and performance-based approach as opposed to a compliance one. This is clearly in line with the direction which government has taken in respect of resource allocation. In future, therefore, potential clients will have to indicate what they are hoping to achieve with the government subsidy, and show how that relates to government priorities. They will have to account at the end of the funding period on whether these goals have been achieved. Government wants to see a return on its investment in sport and recreation. Success on the part of Federations will also determine whether future subsidies will be forthcoming.
Allow me Honourable Members, to express my concern about the slow rate of progress in promoting a more equitable dispensation for women in sport in our country. Despite the efforts by the Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee, women politicians in the provinces and the Technical Intergovernmental Committee on Sport to address the problem, hardly any headway has been made in addressing this very urgent matter. For me, changes in this crucial sphere must be prioritised and I shall be focusing attention on the matter during this financial year. I appeal to all role-players to contribute to ensuring that women take their rightful place in all spheres in sport and recreation in our country. I am encouraged by the commitment that I have witnessed in the fledgling female boxing domain in South Africa and abroad, and I am hopeful that women such as Ms Precious Baloyi who umpired in the recent Davis Cup tie between South Africa and Yugoslavia, Valerie Dorset from the USA who judged the Lewis-Rahman fight at Carnival City, and our own Siya Vabazawho also judged an international fight involving Zolani Patelo, can inspire other women to emulate their pioneering spirit.
I am of the opinion that Sport and Recreation has been capacitated in the past year to the extent that we have been provided with resources that we could only have dreamt of before. The access that we have been afforded to "Poverty Relief, Infrastructure Creation and Job Summit" funds has positioned us amongst major role players in the public sector to tackle one of the biggest challenges of our times in this country, namely, poverty. In our quest to access these resources, we have argued that the building of sport and recreation facilities in disadvantaged communities can contribute to temporary and permanent job creation, income generation and, hence, poverty relief. We are committed to making a success of this project over the next three years with a view to securing these funds as part of our baseline budget beyond 2004, to facilitate delivery in an area in which there is also a huge backlog in our country. We shall be contributing to the resolution of the twin problems: poverty as well as the shortage of sports facilities that exists in disadvantaged communities. We have been granted R40 million in the first year of the project, R96 million in the second, and R 29 million in the third year, provided we are successful in each of the three years. I am committed to ensuring that success.
Madam Speaker, Honourable Members, last year I spoke about my intention to bring sport and recreation into the mainstream of government efforts aimed at working for change in the country. I believe that our "Building for Sport and Recreation" project is aimed at doing exactly that in the context of our stated intention of integrated planning and delivery. Ours will be a concerted effort along with those of our sister departments to prioritise the poor and disadvantaged, and to contribute to rural development and urban renewal. We shall be building and upgrading sport and recreation facilities in each of the provinces using labour intensive methods in which we will engage local communities. In the first year of the project, we shall have reached 33% of the poverty nodes identified for urgent intervention by the President, and cover all 100% of them over the ensuing two years. I would like to urge Members of the House to become involved in these projects in their constituencies to ensure that our investments are sound and that the communities and especially rural women involved will indeed benefit. Moreover, our people must take ownership of the facilities to guard against them being vandalised. We are also planning to have the facilities appropriately named after veterans of the anti-apartheid struggle as sports' contribution to symbolic reparation for the suffering of our people under that order.
Madam Speaker, Honourable members, in his response to the debate on his State of the Nation Address, the President mandated the Departments responsible for Sport and Recreation, Education, Arts and Culture, and the Youth Commission, to design programmes that will engage the youth constructively. We have risen to that challenge. We have developed a comprehensive programme that should provide many opportunities on an ongoing basis for participation in constructive activities. We shall be involved side by side with the Youth Commission, as part of this initiative, in celebrating the 25th anniversary of the Soweto uprising with a substantial sports programme that, as I have intimated earlier, will culminate in the rugby test between South Africa and France on June 16 at Ellis Park. In our broader programme, we have engaged the United School Sports Association of South Africa substantially and have ensured, through this initiative, that we also address the problem of HIV/AIDS through their "Love-Life Games". This programme will be implemented throughout the country, from the local through to the regional, provincial and national levels.
In latter regard also, Madam Speaker, Honourable Members, you will agree with me that the school sport issue has remained unresolved for too long. My Colleague, the Minister of Education and I, have come to an agreement that we shall assume joint responsibility for school sport and physical education. The Department of Education will assume responsibility for the curricular aspects of physical education and school sport including inter-school sport at the local and, maybe, at the regional level, while Sport and Recreation will assume responsibility for representative school sport at the provincial, national and international levels. We are still grappling with the problem of resourcing this important venture and will have to be innovative in finding solutions to this problem. I intend calling a national school sports indaba later this year in which all stakeholders will have the opportunity to deliberate on a way forward. I call on USSASA, teacher unions, sports coaches, SASSU and even parents to assist me in making this indaba a success and to participate in it vigorously.
Madam Speaker, Honourable Members,
The past few months have been historical for the sports movement. We have witnessed the dissolution of the National Sports Council and the handing over of the baton, which they carried so successfully along with their predecessors, SACOS, the pioneers of non-racial sport, to the South African Sports Commission. This event certainly marked the end of an era in our sports history and we need to pay homage to all those stalwarts, both in SACOS and the NSC, who sacrificed so much to ensure that non-racial sport prevailed, and that it made the contribution that it did to the liberation of our people from the shackles of apartheid. I shall not even attempt to single out individuals who played a significant role in the struggle, for that list is too long, and I am fearful of leaving out people who contributed to this team effort. I would, however, like to acknowledge some of our compatriots who have passed on such as Hassan Howa, Morgan Naidoo, M.N. Pather, Colin Clarke, and Uncle Bill Jardine, amongst others.
The meeting earlier this month of the South African Sports Commission's General Assembly, represents another significant milestone in our sports history and judging from the turnout and lively debate at that forum, I am convinced that we have a winning formula that will ensure that every sportsperson in our country has access to a structure through which to make his/her voice heard. Moreover, the General Assembly will serve as a watchdog that will ensure that the Sports Commission delivers on its mandate.
While I am sure that there is room for improvement, the SASC is fast beginning to show its mettle. They have successfully launched the South African Indigenous Games at a captivating event at a most appropriate venue, the Basotho Cultural Village in QwaQwa in the Free State earlier this year, fulfilling a long held desire of the President to see these activities that were facing extinction, being revived. The indigenous games will not only involve more South Africans in wholesome physical activity, but also ensure that we preserve a very important part of our culture.
We must insist that some of the indigenous sports that are common to the Southern African region should become part of the Zone 6 Games. Thereafter, we can strive to take them to the All Africa Games and in that manner ensure that we contribute to an African recovery in which we are accorded the necessary recognition for our rich cultural history. The Eastern Cape Province has just launched their own chapter of Indigenous Games and I would like to encourage all other provinces that have not done so yet, to follow suit.
The SASC is involved in numerous other projects, the most significant of which relates to the role that they are playing in providing scientific support to athletes preparing for participation in international competition. The focus of their activities now relates to the preparation of our team that will participate in the Commonwealth Games in Manchester next year. Theirs is a mammoth task and we wish them well in their endeavours. The SASC is also hard at work preparing for the re-introduction of the South African Games, a competition that will slot into the four-year development cycle, which culminates in the Olympic Games. This fits well with the proposal of the Ministerial Task Team for a developmental approach to international participation.
We have also witnessed the establishment of a Distribution Agency for allocating funds that have accrued from the National Lottery, to non-governmental agencies in sport and recreation. Sport and Recreation, as you are aware, has been identified as one of the good causes that will benefit from the proceeds of the National Lottery Fund. I would like to urge sports structures to access those funds to promote their activities, especially in the disadvantaged areas. The Distribution Agency has put out a call for proposals for the first allocation that has become available and has focused on the development of facilities, the supply of sport equipment and kit, and human resource development as priorities during the first round. Applications close in two days time on 31 May. I have a concern, however, about the capacity in sports clubs and associations in disadvantaged communities in particular, to develop and write proposals. That may result in us not achieving the desired outcomes. Moreover, should we not receive appropriate proposals, it may also suggest that sport and recreation is not in need of the funds. As you are all aware, that is far from the truth. I would, therefore, like to urge institutions such as the Sports Commission and other agencies, to support our community sports and recreation structures in this regard to ensure that they are indeed able to benefit from the lottery to which they have contributed so loyally. I am clear in my mind that the allocation of lottery funds cannot merely involve dishing out the resources to recipients. There must be accountability, failing which we shall have made no headway in uplifting our communities. I shall be approaching my Colleague in the Department of Trade and Industry to satisfy myself that sufficient controls are in place to ensure delivery to the communities that have been targeted in this project. Madam Speaker, Honourable Members, we have in the past complained about a shortage of funds in sport and recreation, not any more. The ball is now squarely in our court to prove that we are indeed able to use the resources that have been put at our disposal.
Madam Speaker, we have had an eventful sports year during 2000-2001. The highlight was most certainly the Sydney Olympic and Paralympic Games in which our teams competed. In the Olympic Games our athletes managed to reach a record number of 28 finals, but were, unfortunately, only able to win 5 medals (2 silver and 3 bronze) against some of the fiercest competition that we have ever witnessed in Olympic competition. Our Paralympians did us proud in capturing 13 gold, 12 silver and 13 bronze medals and, thereby, endearing themselves to the South African public. We are proud of all our successful athletes. Of course, the Games also saw the retirement of Penny Heyns from competitive swimming. We shall miss this icon in South African sport and we wish her well with her plans. We also thank all the sponsors that have made our participation possible. Our cricketers continue to enjoy success and have become the first team in history to beat the West Indies on home soil in both the one-day internationals, (winning 5-2), and test series (which they won 3-1). The Sharks made it to the finals of the Super 12 series but, unfortunately, lost to the Brumbies. The Tri-Nations Series for 2001 looms large and we wish our team well in their campaign. Bafana Bafana must be congratulated for their performances during the past year and allow me also to congratulate the Buccaneers for their success in what must surely have been one of the closely contested and most exciting league competitions in years! Allow me also to congratulate Thabo Mngomeni and Desiree Ellis for their nominations for soccer awards in Africa.
Our annual Presidential Sports Awards function was very special this year and for the first time, featured a more representative cross section of our sportspeople being acknowledged for their achievements in, and commitment to service in sport and recreation. We recognised a number of sportspeople who have never before been afforded the recognition that they deserve, including Tap Tap Makhatini, Mono Badela, Coetie Neethling, Patson Banda and Zanele Situ, amongst many others. I would like to honour more of the SACOS stalwarts in next year's ceremony including Frank van der Horst, Joe Ebrahim, Reggie Feldman and Harry Hendricks. I also think that it is high time that we honour Denis Brutus who must surely stand out as an icon in the early days of the sports struggle.
The year ahead holds many interesting challenges for us in sport and recreation. As of today, as I have already stated, we shall be hosting the IICGADS and WADA conferences. I would like to extend a word of thanks to the South African Institute for Drug free Sport for their support in this endeavour and congratulate them on the high standards and international recognition they have been able to maintain. Their status at the Council of Europe Monitoring Group of the Anti-Doping Convention, the role of certain Board members on WADA, and the continuing high standards of our IOC accredited laboratory in Bloemfontein, is something to be proud of. Later this year the world, "Sport for All" federation, TAFISA will be holding its international conference in Cape Town. Our athletics team which will be participating in the World Championships in Edmonton, Canada later this year has been announced and we wish them well both in their preparations, and for the event itself. The 2003 Cricket World Cup Organising Committee is hard at work to ensure that their event will be the biggest and most successful World Cup in the history of the sport ever. The World Cup Committee will be doing a presentation to Cabinet shortly, and I am sure that the Portfolio Committee will want to engage them as well. I am clear that the 2003 World Cup must be a truly South African event in every respect from which the whole country will benefit. I shall, therefore, watch their progress with keen interest. I shall not dwell on this event in more detail now, as it is still two years away. Allow me to say, however, that since this is one of the few major sports events that we will host in the decade between 2000 and 2010, we must endeavour to utilise the opportunities that it presents to market our country abroad, maximally. Through my Department, we have already facilitated meetings with appropriate stakeholders in this regard. I am of the opinion that the International Marketing Council should also capitalise on the event for the benefit of the country. I would, of course, urge the organising committee to seriously consider taking the games to disadvantaged communities like Chatsworth, Alice, Zwide and Galashewe.
As you know, Bafana Bafana is one point away from qualifying for their second World Cup in a row. The nation stands firmly behind them in their effort to qualify for and their participation in the competition in Korea and Japan in 2002. While on the topic of soccer, you will be aware that SAFA is, once again, gearing itself up to bid for the 2010 World Cup, to which I would like to add my unqualified support. I am confident that we will pull it off this time and that we will be able to run a successful tournament should we win the Bid. I would like to commend the performance of the 2006 Soccer World Cup Bid Committee and their efforts to secure that event for our country. Despite the fact that we were so cruelly denied victory, their excellent work served as a valuable marketing exercise for our country that justified our investment in the Bid. To Charles Dempsey who scuppered our chances so shamelessly, a red card!
NOCSA intends to field a team for the Winter Olympics in 2002 and a Paralympic team will represent South Africa at those Games as well. NOCSA has already embarked on their Athens 2004 campaign having launched a sponsorship drive aimed at preparing athletes for these Games. They continue to be involved in the Sport Against Crime Initiative in which they are using sport role models to encourage young people to refrain from participation in anti-social activities.
They are also involved in development programmes in the rural areas and, as you know, the President of NOCSA, Mr Sam Ramsamy (whose presence in the gallery I want to acknowledge,) is serving as my special advisor on the Ministerial Task Team. A South African team, sponsored by NOCSA and Sport and Recreation South Africa amongst others, will be participating in the World Games for non-Olympic sports in Japan later this year. We wish them well in that campaign.
Swimming South Africa has an ambitious development, as well as a high performance programme. I am particularly impressed with their learn to swim campaign aimed at making young people "water safe" and, indeed, with their effort to encourage an entrepreneurial spirit in our communities through teaching people to swim. Madame Speaker, Honourable Members, I have been working vigorously on investigating the alleged mismanagement of funds by Athletics South Africa, and can report today that I have gathered all the information that will allow me to decide on an appropriate course of action in accordance with my public undertaking in this regard recently.
The Boxing Bill has just been passed in the National Assembly as well as the NCOP and will be promulgated shortly. The Bill provides, as you know, for the establishment of Boxing South Africa. I am confident that this new structure will ensure that boxing in our country is put on a sound footing once again, and that we can close the door on all the problems that we have experienced in the sport in the past. We are in the process of drafting Regulations that will supplement the Boxing Act. I would like to laud the efforts in our female boxing fraternity to put the sport on a firm footing within their ranks. You may be aware that they have just concluded a successful indaba aimed at promoting the sport. I am looking at introducing the Sport and Recreation Amendment Bill into Parliament shortly. The Bill is aimed at consolidating the legislation for sport and recreation that will enable us to exploit the potential of the domain to impact positively toward creating a better life for all in South Africa.
I am in the process of facilitating discussions between the three broadcasters with a view to finalising the question of televising events of national interest. This is an issue whose settlement is long overdue, but I am encouraged by the fact that the broadcasters are showing positive signs of co-operating. Their joint bid for broadcast rights of the 2002 Soccer World Cup in Korea and Japan bears testimony to this. I am still firmly of the belief that our people should not be deprived of opportunities to view their national teams in action in international competitions, locally and abroad, for this would undermine the potential that we claim sports possesses for building the nation and instilling national pride.
The King Commission will present its final report to me shortly. That should put that unsavoury saga behind us finally. I trust that we have all learnt valuable lessons from that experience which will prevent similar occurrences in future. You may have read that the ICC has just brought out its report on match fixing. The Condon report clearly indicates that we are the leading country in dealing with the issue. It is no surprise, therefore, that many of Judge King's preliminary proposals were taken up in the ICC recommendations.
In concluding, Madam Speaker and Honourable Members, I would like to convey a very special thanks to everybody in sports that has made the past year the success that it has been, and who will once again contribute to making the coming year successful. I want to single out the Portfolio Committee on Sport and Recreation and its dynamic leader, Comrade Ruth Bhengu, the staff of the Ministry and the Department, the South African Sports Commission, the members of MINMEC and the TIC, the macro-bodies and their leadership, and everybody involved in the running of sport and recreation in South Africa from the grassroots level, to the very top. We all know that sport and recreation will never be able to function without volunteers. 2001 is the "Year of the Volunteer" and I would, therefore, like to make use of this opportunity to acknowledge the role that volunteers play in bringing the joy of sport and recreation to all of us. We are truly grateful for the contribution that you make.
Lastly, Madam Speaker, Honourable members, I shall be failing in my duty if I do not convey the condolences of this House, once again, to the families of those loyal sports supporters who died so tragically at the Orlando Pirates - Kaiser Chiefs game at Ellis Park. Our thoughts remain with you and we trust that you will find comfort in the knowledge that we will do everything in our power to ensure that such a disaster never happens again. I would like to take this opportunity also to thank the President and Deputy President, my colleagues and the officials in their departments, as well as Members of Parliament, the Diplomatic Corps and lots of other countries who rallied around us so speedily to ensure that the families and victims receive the support necessary to lessen their pain and suffering. The incident left the entire nation traumatised but we remained strong during these times of potential weakness. Roy and Althea Nation, the parents of the youngest victim of that tragedy, Rosswin Nation, are with us in the gallery today, to see for themselves how Parliament shares in their pain. The Commission of Inquiry led by the able Judge Ngoepe has started its work and I feel confident that his recommendations will contribute to making our stadiums safe havens to which our citizens will be attracted to support their clubs and their heroes.
Madame Speaker, Honourable Members, thank you for your kind attention.