Transcription of remarks by Buti Manamela, Deputy Minister in The Presidency during a visit to schools in the Waterberg District, Limpopo
Mayor of Modimolle, Macy Lekalakalea
Member of the Mayoral Committee for Economic Development Mr S Lamola
Member of the Mayoral Committee for Finance Mr J Munshi
Councillor J Sebolai
District Director for the department of Education, Ms J Madela
The Principal of Phagameng
Teachers and learners
The first thing I would like to do is to congratulate you, because it has been a very long twelve years. I hope there is no one who has been here for the thirteenth or fourteenth year but if there is, it means they have stayed the course, they were patient and they have never allowed anybody else to determine who they are and to tell them that they are failures. They basically focused on the end goal which is passing Grade 12.
I want to congratulate you for that and I want you to clap hands for yourselves for having made it. I studied here, I completed my Matric here. I was taught by the teachers here, Mme Sesona taught me Sepedi. I saw Mr Mononyane who taught me biology. Bra Cheeks (that's what we called him behind his back) he taught me English. There are some teachers who are still here like Mr Machabaphala, he taught me Afrikaans and Maths.
There are some others who are still here but I did not do accounting but they taught Accounting like Ms Mosue. There are still the same people who about more or less twenty years ago who taught me are still teaching you.
It means that you have got no excuse, you cannot blame anybody else. It means that you have yourself to push yourself, to push the limits to make sure that you complete this marathon. If you started in Grade R or Grade 1 twelve years later you are here, it means that you can move beyond this hurdle.
I want to ask you three questions, which I think are very important questions and will determine what I will say after you have responded these questions
The first question is:
Have you applied at a university or Further Education and Training (FET) College or a university of technology?
Learners: Yes
Ok, that is very important. It is important because once you have applied it means that you do not want to remain here. You do not want to be wearing the same golf shirt, it is a very nice golf shirt but you do not want to be wearing it next year again. There are projects to build more schools because there is overcrowding. We don't want a situation where you become part of overcrowding because you are repeating. We want you to pass; we want you to go to university, a university of technology or to an FET college.
When I left here I went to study in Mamelodi in a Further Education and Training college. I went to study electronics. For now that is not needed in the Union Buildings but it laid a basis for me. So whatever you do - you may not be admitted at a university but you can still go to a university of technology or to an FET college.
In fact if you go to an FET institution to go and study whatever you want to study and you qualify, you can actually study for free. I don't know if you have known that.
The second question, remember I said three questions, the second question is
If you have applied at university or the other institutions of higher learning have you applied for bursaries?
There is something called the National Student Financial Aid Scheme which government provides. It is part bursary and part loan. It means a certain portion of the money that government pays for your tuition fees is free if you pass all your subjects.
Also I had a meeting yesterday with the chairperson of the National Youth Development Agency. I told him I am going to a school which I studied at and at that school there will also be learners from Solomon Mahlangu High School.
I asked him what I should tell you. He said that I should tell you they have what they call the Solomon Mahlangu scholarship. For the students in Phagameng, Solomon Maglangu, Sedibeng and Mohlakamotala high schools the top 3 learners will receive a full scholarship.
It means that you must work hard. If we have even better results, I'm sure we can tell the National Youth Development Agency (NYDA) to give us more scholarships. It is all about us making sure that we perform much better. The scholarship includes everything from tuition, transport, study material etc.
They have priority subjects which are part of the scarce skills, which means you will have to either be an actuarial scientist or a statistician or any of those scarce skills that the NYDA has identified. We also need more Doctors and more engineers. The MMC for economic development was reminding me that I studied electronics engineering. I am yet to apply it.
The beautiful thing about being from here, not only Phagameng, Modimolle but also being from Limpopo is that we are stepping on the footsteps of people who have done great things in the country.
Last week the President announced the governor of the Reserve Bank, Ntate Leseja Kganyago. He is from Limpopo and he will be signing the money. That means when we have money it will have the signature of Leseja Kganyago. He is a product of this province and many others are as well.
Ms Madela was telling us this morning how we have so many people from this region and how beautiful our region is so we need to step into those footsteps of those people who have made a mark for themselves.
Many of those couldn't have done that without going through school. We have many examples of people who have succeeded in life even though they did not pass Martic, but many people needed the foundation of Form Five, or Martic, or Grade twelve in your case to make sure that they do all they want to do, which leads me to the third question that I want to ask you.
Have you decided what you want to do after passing matric?
Learners: Yes
In fact that is even wonderful because if you do not know what you want to do after passing your matric you may actually not pass your Matric because you don't know what you want to do after Martic. Once you have decided that - you may want to be a lawyer, a doctor or an actor. Do you know Florence Masebe? She went to the University of Cape Town to study acting. It is not only a natural talent, but she went to study to be an actor.
You also know DJ Fresh? He went to Boston College to study to be a DJ. So all these people that you see on TV, It is also about their natural talent they went to study.
Our President - they always mock him and joke about the fact that he didn't go to school. He didn't have the opportunity that you have to go to school. We cannot make excuses and say the President did not go to school. In fact he fought very hard that you will have the opportunity to go to school.
You cannot use those kinds of excuses to try and get out of going to school. Everyone is looking at you. Come the first day of examinations, everybody will be looking at you. Forget about other pressures rather focus on the end goal. Ensure that you look at what lies ahead of Grade 12.
I'm sure the twelve years have been very long, you do not want to come back here, you want to go to university or an FET college, you want to go and study further. You also want to make sure that you make your mark.
You don't want to be that person when we go bury you we say "so and so was born he lived and he died”. There is no full stop no comma, no paragraph, nothing! You want to make sure we really mean it when we say we miss you. You don't want a situation where your friends don't want to talk to you because you have become a burden. We want you to take this country forward.
Bra Cheeks, Ms Mosue and the Principal are old now. They need people to replace them, don't worry Sadtu will ensure that teachers are paid better (laughter). We need all of you to come and make South Africa a better place.
I heard that we are targeting 85% pass rate. This means that we must have 100% pass rate at Phagameng and Solomon Mahlangu High Schools. I wish you all the best and I'm sure that with the way in which you are going to pass will put more pressure on the NYDA to increase the number of bursaries so that we have all of these professions in Phagameng and throughout Modimolle.
Thank you.
