Programme Director;
Honourable, Mr Tony Blair (in his absentia), Chairman of Beyond Sport Ambassadors;
Lord Paddy Ashdown, Chairman, UNICEF UK and Former UN High Representative, Bosnia and Herzegovina;
Mr Wilfred Lemke, Special Adviser to the UN Secretary-General on Sport, Development and Peace;
Mr Danny Jordaan, Former CEO of FIFA World Cup 2010 Local Organising Committee;
Ms Bridgette Radebe, Executive Chairperson of Mmakau Mining (Pty) Ltd;
Mr Michael Johnson, Multi-Olympic Gold Medallist;
Mr Oscar Pistorius, South Africa’s Mighty Multi-Paralympic Gold Medalist;
Mr Lucas Radebe, South Africa’s Soccer Stalwart and Former Bafana Bafana Captain and Ambassador of 2010 FIFA World Cup;
Ms Vanessa Haywood, our Actress and Activist;
Mr Danny K, South Africa’s Musician and Co-Founder of SHOUT Foundation;
Mr Methembe Ndlovu, Co-Founder of the Grassroots Soccer and Former Zimbabwe Football Captain;
Distinguished Delegates and Conference Participants;
Distinguished Guests;
Colleagues;
Ladies and Gentlemen;
Fellow South Africans and International Guests;
Thank you very much for inviting me to this august gathering of Beyond Sport Summit and Awards 2011; a well-known and unique assembly of senior and highly experienced personalities and institutions in the sport, art, culture, recreation and media industries, joining hands with political figures of profound international standing. Indeed, it is with great honour and privilege for us to accept this responsibility to deliver the Keynote Address on behalf of the Republic of South Africa and her people and also welcome all distinguished guests to the shores of the Republic.
Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to the City of Cape Town, the city at the southern tip of the Western Cape Province of the Republic of South Africa. As you have already seen, South Africa is a place where mountains rise, where majestic sceneries drift into distant horizons, where the sun thaws out into warm seas. A place where you can discern the beginning of time.
This country is a place that is robust and vibrant; where you will find sport, recreation, art and culture exploding and exuberant coupled with its wild life of roaring lions and whispering grasslands; where you will enjoy so much more with its peaceful and warm people. Our people call this land Mzantsi and they are proud to call it their home; they have so much to offer. They collectively believe that ‘working together they can do more’ for their country.
South Africa is a unique country; a country united in its diversity; a nation with possibilities; and people with farsightedness and imbued with passion; a nation of forgivers but not forgetters; a home full with a spirit of Ubuntu.
Distinguished Guests, as we are all aware that the divided and shameful past of our country and people, which was dislodged through a democratic process in 1994 when we had our first historic democratic and people-centred elections, was characterised by a plethora of apartheid discriminatory laws and practices based on race, gender and class. The sport and recreation sector did not escape the scourge of legalised, institutionalised and non-institutionalised racial, gender and class practices.
The black majority, Africans in particular, the indigenous people of this land, did not have equal rights and access to sport and recreation as well as competitive or recreational sport opportunities at school and community levels. There was lack of or no investment in communities where the majority of the people resided. This disinvestment was also evident in areas such as sport infrastructure, sport equipment and attire, sport development and talent identification and/or sport activities especially for historically disadvantaged national groups who are blacks in general and Africans in particular; of whom the majority are women living in rural areas.
For this reason, the apartheid South Africa was subjected to international sporting sanctions and isolation including its few white only sport bodies and sport personalities from international sport and cultural competitions and activities. It is in this instance that, irrespective of the racial, gender and class practices various sports bodies and individuals, black and white, fought tirelessly towards a sport system that is inclusive and democratic, free from discrimination and where there are equal opportunities for all South Africans regardless of colour, sex, social status and creed.
Ladies and Gentlemen, the dawn of democracy in 1994 and the subsequent election of a democratic government in South Africa marshalled in momentous changes to policies and legislation that was aimed at changing all aspects of political, social, economic landscape as well as human rights of all people.
These legislative changes impacted upon all sectors of our society including sport and recreation. All these changes where driven by the democratic state and its people with the sole aim of transforming our country into a free, united, non-racial, non-sexist, democratic and prosperous society where our people see their society as just and equitable society that meets the basic needs of its people by creating a better life for all.
Yes, to us South Africans, yesterday is a foreign country; now the future belongs to us; and indeed, today is better than yesterday and tomorrow will be better than today!
It is in this regard that the developmental state based on its understanding and that of our people of the important socio-economic and developmental role of sport, sport and recreation was identified as a strategic sector to unite the nation and build social cohesion based on principles of patriotism and citizenship.
Thus this sector was identified as needing to be transformed to be in line with the national goals of the Republic to, among other things, increase and ensure equitable access to all sporting opportunities, harness and further develop the competitive abilities and capabilities of all South Africans to participate meaningfully to sport and recreation as to freely participate in international sport competitions even in Africa and for the sector to reflect the demographics of the country.
Since then sport has been called upon to demonstrate tangible benefits to the country and its people if it is to compete with many other strategic sectors of our society. In this regard, South Africa used sport as an instrument to teach African values and values of human solidarity and human civilization. Our country uses sport as a tool to instil social cohesion and nation building whilst at the same time imparting discipline and build a vehicle to touch the lives of all ordinary people, regardless of race, gender, class, disability, language, and age as well as geographical location.
Distinguished Guests, South Africa leverages on sport and recreation to contribute into the fight against poverty, underdevelopment and ignorance. We strongly believe on encouraging healthy lifestyles by significantly enhancing the quality of life of all our people. We use play, leisure, fitness, physical education, schools sport and community sport to mould the physical culture and nature of our nation based on the agenda of advancing sustainable development in different sectors of our society.
In this context we would like to call upon all members of the Beyond Sport to join hands with us in the Schools Sport programme roll-out plan to make all our schools in South Africa to be incubators and nurseries for sport development and talent identification. We want to use schools sport as a platform to encourage social integration and integrated social inclusion. We would like you all to put your valuable time aside to assist our educators with the necessary coaching and officiating skills as well as sport administration and management.
We would like to use this available platform to exchange ideas on how we, together with you, can fast-track the implementation of our national sports and recreation plan. We hope to discuss with you modern ways of developing modern sport clubs and teams. We want to share experiences with you on how to use modern technology to advance sport development especially at the level of clubs and federations.
As our Indaba has resolved to streamline the development of the Recreation Movement in South Africa, your breakaways will enhance South Africa’s ability to investigate and develop what you call ‘Unique Income Streams for NGOs in sport and recreation; and at the same time develop “Alternative Resources from the Private Sector” towards the benefit of sport and recreation in our country.
This will assist all of us to create a shared value for sport and recreation in our community, and use the power of sport to unite all our people across the world.
The document developed by SRSA called a case for sport not only emphasises the impact of sport and recreation on the South African society in general, but also provides direction regarding the critical areas for sport development in our country.
Sport has always been an important part of society, but with the global emergence of sport tourism it has also become an increasingly important part of the economy. Consequently, the measurement and evaluation of benefits and costs of sporting events to host destinations and communities has become a focus of increasing interest to a number of groups, especially policy makers and sporting officials. Based on the proven economic benefits and impact that sport has delivered to a number of countries, our observation is that governments worldwide have become increasingly supportive of further investment in sport as an industry.
Sport economy and tourism is a tool for achieving many things – to create thousands of new needed jobs and create work and even help change cultural perceptions, for instance in the Middle East, South Africa and more recently, in Germany where it created new German identity during the 2006 FIFA World Cup. We all saw how East and West Germany came together through the medium of sport.
In South Africa we have also experienced the power of sport in hosting numerous world-class sporting events such the Cricket, Rugby and Soccer World Cups. As a country we have largely benefitted from these events – not only economically but also in critical areas such as social cohesion and nation building. Do I need to remind you of what was achieved by South Africa during the 2010 FIFA World Cup?
The World Cup tournament confirmed that South Africans are capable of working together in unity. We never thought it possible that South Africans could demonstrate their love for this country and one another in that manner before. Our country has indeed witnessed a spirit of coming together and a spirit of Ubuntu.
Therefore, our Ministry firmly believes that sport is one of the most important cohesive factors in uniting the entire nation. This potential should be further harnessed for the good of the South African community. We should fully utilize the opportunity that sport offers to demonstrate the best qualities of South African society to the world.
And I will not be doing justice to my brief if I do not take this opportunity and platform with so many international guests to advocate for South Africa as a tourist destination of choice. We have sport and adventure activities and destinations in South Africa that will ensure a lifetime experience for every participant. Over and above our major sporting events; we have some of the most beautiful hiking trails in the world, we have white water rafting and abseiling off Table Mountain. We have the Cape Argus cycle race, the Comrades Marathon and a host of other activities and attractions. Just come and enjoy it in this beautiful country!
This positive role of sport and recreation was cemented in the last National Sport and Recreation Indaba recently hosted by SRSA in November 2011. On this august gathering of sports people of the Republic of South Africa and various organs of government from all spheres, as well as South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee (SASCOC) and Federations met to craft a way forward for sport and recreation in our country.
In line with the work of the Indaba and the adopted resolutions as well as the spirit of the Indaba Declaration we have managed to align and integrate transformation, the transformation charter, schools sport programme and all other poignant issues discussed under different topics of the Indaba into the draft national sport and recreation plan with tailored scorecards that are going to be the bedrock for our collective case for sport and recreation.
This Indaba has managed to pause and took stock on the road traversed since the unity talks in 1992 and was coupled by the intense review of the progress made since the 2008 national sport Indaba held in KwaZulu-Natal.
Very importantly, we have concluded the Indaba with the adoption of a National Sport and Recreation Plan that is the collective expression of sports people in South Africa. This plan captures our strategic priorities into achievable outcomes that are measurable. The overall strategic focus of the National Sport Plan is to reconstruct and revitalise the sport and recreation sector for an active and winning nation whilst improving the quality of lives of all South Africans.
The National Sport and Recreation Plan is therefore focused on increasing levels of participation in sport and recreation, as well as achieving success in international sport. The Plan focuses on these two internationally recognised pillars for a successful sport system as well as the enablers required.
We would therefore like to continue and maximise our efforts in the spirit of the Indaba and build on that foundation for a well-rounded and a sound sport system in our country.
We will do so determined to alter the balance of forces in sport and recreation landscape towards a united, non-racial, non-sexist, democratic and prosperous sport and recreation system in the Republic, because we believe that seventeen years in our democratic dispensation South African sport is still faced with a huge backlog in terms of transformation, our national teams are still predominantly unrepresentative, distribution of facilities is still skewed and access not open to all.
In this regard we would like to leverage on many platforms provided to us gain weighty evidence to the undoubted ability of sport to make a tangible difference to people’s lives worldwide, and to generate a greater awareness of the positive role of sport, brainstorm ideas, make connections and encourage actual policy change if needs be.
Please enjoy your stay in South Africa.
Thank you.
Keynote speech of the Minister of Sport and Recreation South Africa (SRSA), Honourable Mr Fikile A Mbalula (MP), on the occasion of the Beyond Sport Summit and Awards 2011, Cape Town International Convention Centre (CTICC), City of Cape Town, Western Cape
