B Marshoff: Free State State of the Province Address

10 February 2006

Honourable Speaker and Deputy Speaker of the Free State Legislature
Honourable leaders of our political parties and honourable members
The Mayor of Mangaung
The Leadership of SALGA
All Executive Mayors and Mayors
Our Honoured Traditional Leaders
Senior Managers of the Free State Provincial Government
Representatives of the Private Sector
Representatives of our Public Entities
All our Social Partners
Ladies and gentlemen
Dear comrades and friends

It is indeed an honour, ladies and gentlemen, to address the third session
of the opening of the legislature exactly fifty years after the brave women of
our movement marched to the union building to protest against the then
apartheid regime. The 50th Anniversary of National Women’s Day epitomises the
gallant role our womenfolk played in the struggle for democracy. We are humbled
by the presence in this house today by some of these heroines who took part in
this historic march. As part of our tribute in the province we are proud to
announce that some of those women who participated in that historic march are
proud beneficiaries of houses provided by this government in Winburg and
Theunissen.

This we have done and continue to do to remind us that there can never be
genuine liberation of a nation without the complete emancipation of women. The
vision of the democratic government centrally integrates the genuine
emancipation of women as a fundamental goal; hence ours continues to be about
the creation of a fully-fledged non-racial, non-sexist, democratic and
prosperous society. We spare no energy in ensuring that we continue to
strengthen our efforts in improving the lot of the quality of life of women in
the province by increasing their participation in all aspects of our
socio-economic life including in the labour market, social policy, governance,
arts, sports and culture.

We are also privileged, comrades and friends, to be addressing the
legislature of our people on the solemn occasion of the 30th Anniversary of the
National Youth Day. We salute the youth for the heroic role they played in
fighting for national liberation. Their continued active participation in
unfolding process of democratisation, reconstruction and development should
equally be encouraged.

Again, honourable speaker, we are proud to announce that the provincial
government with assistance of the private sector including the financial
institutions has employed more than 2000 young people who were part of the
unemployed graduate’s database compiled by the Free State Youth Commission.
This database feeds into the national database, which the President spoke about
last week. The database is a product of extensive research and consultation by
the commission. It is therefore reliable and encompasses the cross section of
skills and intellectual capital found across our province. More needs to be
done. We are, however confident that this development is a major affront in our
efforts to reduce unemployment and eradicate poverty among young people of our
province and for this reason we agree with former President Nelson Mandela in
his observation that: ”The youth of our country are the valued possession of
the nation. Without them there can be no future. Their needs are immense and
urgent.”

This year is also an historic one, honourable speaker, because we will as a
nation celebrate the 10th anniversary of our democratic and progressive
constitution. As we celebrate the coming of age of our constitution, we should
call upon our people to rise in defence of their human rights and dignity and
ensure that never again shall we regress to a point where racial discrimination
is institutionalised. We would like to take this opportunity to condemn in
strongest possible terms, the alleged racial crimes that have been taking place
in our province. There is no place for racists and bigots in a non-racial Free
State province.

May I remind everyone that as a ruling party we have just concluded “The
Year of popular mobilisation to advance the vision of the Freedom Charter”. We
are confident that we have worked hard to hegemonise the perspective of
fundamental social transformation and consolidated our resources and the
collective will of our people to move forward with more determination.

The third Democratic Local Government Elections

It is now five years since the current dispensation of local government was
introduced in December of 2000. We therefore, together with our people, must
take the opportunity presented by the holding of the third Local Government
Elections to report to our people and to asses progress we have made in
building a developmental system of local government.

Our main activities, as government, during this Second Decade of Freedom are
largely going to be geared towards halving unemployment and poverty. To this
extent the whole of government, including local government, will have to play
an activist and interventionist role in the economy so as to steer growth and
development, and in this regard, we need to appraise the capacity we have and
still need to build within local government to drive local economic
development.

The third democratic local government elections must in many ways help
strengthen the popular participatory character of our democracy. Our leaders in
local government should, among others, make time to allow our people to talk
while they listen. Council structures, which make popular participation
possible, should be strengthened. We need to build our municipalities into real
democratic organs of self-government.

The Free State Growth and Development Strategy:
Our Cardinal Road Map

Mr Speaker, we wish to reiterate from the onset that in the context of our
country and our province, we are pursuing development from the conviction that
ours is a developmental activist state with a clear responsibility to tackle
poverty, joblessness and economic inequalities.

We have a mandate to expand economic opportunities for our people, to fight
social deprivation and to provide public facilities for the poor. We have a
duty to grow the economy and restructure productive forces as well as
redefining production relations with emphasis on gender equality.

All of these are urgent matters as the national cabinet Lekgotla of June
2004 cautions us that:
“The advances made in the First decade by far supersede the weaknesses. Yet if
all indicators were to continue along the same trajectory, especially in
respect of the dynamic of economic exclusion and inclusion, we could soon reach
a point where the negative overwhelms the positive…”

Clearly, this requires our government to be both focused and decisive. There
must be a willingness to weigh trade-offs and to make choices.

In the last State of the Province Address, we announced that a process of
drafting the Free State Provincial Growth and Development Strategy (FSGDS) was
in motion. We are delighted that as we speak today the FSGDS is a living
document incorporating a broad development policy framework representing a
watershed for development in the province. It outlines the basic provincial
priorities and is also a guiding tool to carry over our plans and vision
towards 2014.

Having launched the FSGDP on 20 May 2005, we moved swiftly to ensure all
other policy and planning platforms are aligned to it as the main policy
framework. This includes our budget allocations over this Medium Term
Expenditure Framework (MTEF) period and baselines thereof. We have in this
instance increased our allocations for infrastructure, a point we will
elaborate later. We have been humbled by the enthusiastic participation of our
social partners and the optimism with which our Growth and Development Strategy
has been received by the people of our Province.

It is this enthusiasm and optimism that will inspire all of us in government
to pursue our responsibilities with a sense of urgency and robustness. We are
already in the process of finalising our Monitoring and Evaluation tools so
that we can be measured in terms of the realistic targets which we have placed
for ourselves, because whereas the 2014 vision remains our futuristic framework
for Growth and Development, we must break it down into annual business plans
which must be well resourced for maximum impact.

Good Governance and Effective Administration

During the period under review, we are confident that we have taken decisive
actions on a number of focussed areas, thereby ensuring that the confluence of
possibilities in our country and province is such that our province has entered
a road of faster economic growth and job creation, faster and more efficient
provision of quality services, increased social cohesion and the reduction of
the paradigm of exclusion prevalent amongst sections of our society.

This means that in terms of government planning, there has to be much more
integration and synergy between and amongst all spheres of government.

The alignment summit held in October 2005 managed to align all the municipal
IDPs to the objectives of Free State Growth and Development Strategy as well as
aligning the Provincial Spatial Development Plan to the National Spatial
Development Perspective and as a result we can now execute our development
strategies with the full confidence that we are investing our resources where
they are mostly needed and where their developmental spin-offs will be
sustainable. We will during the next financial year finally consolidate the
alignment process and make it a normal way of governance moving forward.

In keeping with our sense of urgency and the need to have effective
co-ordination so as to successfully attain our growth and developmental
objectives we have established four cabinet clusters which speak directly to
the following objectives.

* Economic Growth, Development and Employment
* Justice and Crime Prevention
* Social and Human Development
* Effective governance and administration

It is our intention during the new financial year to capacitate our
municipalities to develop and implement similar cluster arrangements so that
our system of co-operative governance should function optimally and thus create
a condition for all spheres of government to work closely to improve their
capacity to implement their programmes including the development of realistic
local development plans

In keeping with the prescripts of the Intergovernmental Relations Act, we
have created structures that enhance co-operative governance amongst all levels
of government in the province. These include:

1. The Premier’s Co-ordinating Council (PCC) which is attended by amongst
others, the Premier, Mayors and MECs. The PCC meets quarterly and focus on
strategic coordination of the functions of government at both the Provincial,
District and Local government
2. The Technical PCC, which is a forum of the Director General Municipal
Managers and South African Local Government Association (SALGA).

Mr Speaker, ladies and gentlemen, we are very passionate about local
government because of our deep-seated conviction that it is the point of direct
contact with local people. We are mindful of challenges which confronted us
during the last year and we are more inspired to consolidate our partnership
with our people to make local government a true repository of our people’s
aspirations. In our endeavour to continuously support and strengthen our
capacity at that level, we launched Project Consolidate as an intervention
aimed at:

* Improving the provision of basic services to communities
* Enhancing Local economic Development
* Improve financial viability of municipalities especially as a result of
challenge brought about by the Municipal Finance Management Act
* Consolidating the transformation of municipalities and
* Entrenching the culture of good governance

We are very satisfied with the progress we have registered thus far and in
order to effectively respond to the identified local government challenges, we
are going to give attention to critical skills necessary for effective service
delivery such as programme management, financial management, engineering, local
economic development and public participation skills.

The recruitment and intake of Community Development Workers went on very
smoothly. To date 94 CDWs have successfully completed their training programme
and will be inaugurated early this year. The second generation of 198 CDWs
learners were recruited and commenced their orientation programme in November
last year. The impact of these specialised cadres of the public services will
accelerate the service delivery capacity and the public participation efforts
of our government.

We are going to continue with our mass outreach programmes through our
government Imbizos and Exco Meets the People Campaigns. Over the last year, we
covered every corner of our province and interacted with the masses of our
people who spoke out on instances of poor service delivery and equally
commended us where we were doing well. During this year’s outreach programme,
we will involve national departments, parastatals and willing partners from the
private sector so that together we present a united front of our urgent mandate
of fighting poverty and undermining underdevelopment.

We will make greater use of our Multi Purpose Community Centres (MPCCs) to
make sure that beyond our visits to communities, our people are able to have
access to critical information wherever they are. We are pleased to announce
that we are going to officially launch three fully fledged MPCCs in Trompsburg,
Zastron and Tseki. We will also hand over centres in Winburg and Hertzogville
following the successful conclusion of discussions involving the two
communities and ABSA. We wish to thank ABSA for their generous support and
assistance in this regard.

Our long-term view is that each municipality must have at least one MPCC as
part of our commitment to ensure Integrated Service Delivery and taking
services to where people are and in this regard, we want to make a call to all
municipalities to prioritise the establishment of MPCCs as an integral aspect
of their IDP review processes.

Alongside the Community Development Workers and the Multi Purpose Community
Centres are the Ward Committees, which are the cornerstones of our democracy.
Our Ward Committees are not functioning at optimal strength and we take this
opportunity to urge members of our communities to take full advantage of these
institutions of democratic participation at our disposal. Our democracy can
only get stronger if all of us appreciate that we, the people are the principal
drivers of our transformation and our active participation in the strengthening
of our democracy is a key aspect in this regard.

The effective utilisation of Information Technology for developmental
purposes remains our key priority for this new financial year. The progress we
have registered with our e-government project, points to some remarkable
progress. Among our targets are that by 2013 all learners; educators and
managers are fully computer literate. To support e-government project, we are
going to ensure that sufficient funds are available to establish and maintain
connectivity, equipment, service points and skills development. We will also
create the necessary coordination capacity to ensure collaboration of
e-projects at local and provincial governmental levels.

Mr Speaker, the institution of traditional leadership is vital for a
transformed system of local governance such as ours. Traditional leaders have a
critical role to play in governance at all levels but most importantly at local
government level. It is for this reason that together with the House of
Traditional leaders in the Free State, we facilitated a conference held under
the theme: “Transformation agent for rural economic and social development”

The main aim of this conference was to support traditional leaders so as to
effectively participate in all governance matters. It is encouraging to note
that already our traditional leaders are active in other sectoral departmental
committees such as HIV and AIDS, Poverty Relief, Integrated Sustainable Rural
Development Plan committees as well as the African Peer Revue Mechanism
Provincial Governing Council.

We will always endeavour to build our capacity as government so that our
responsibility towards our people is never failed. The Free State Training and
Development Institute will continue to play a critical role in building the
capacity of our public servants in line with our works skills plan. The Free
State Training Institute will collaborate with institutions of higher education
in the province to strategically reposition it for the continual generation of
the necessary intellectual base for our provincial government.

Our Provincial Human Resource Development Strategy is geared towards the
attainment of our growth and development objectives as well as responding to
the structural problem of the skills mismatch in our provincial economy. The
year 2006 will see a much more robust and aggressive approach towards the
promotion of intermediate to high-level technical and vocational skills. Our
youth must be encouraged to take full advantage of the Further Education and
Training colleges, which are repositioned to respond to the skills problems of
our country.

To date government has already invested R160 Million over the last five
years on our bursary programme. We challenge the private sector to match us
Rand for Rand or to even better our investment in the skills development
programmes of our youth.

Mr Speaker, youth development can never be treated as peripheral to the
integrated socio-economic transformation and development of our province.

As we pay tribute to the heroism of our youth, this year we are going to
ensure that cabinet adopts the Integrated Youth Development Strategy and that
it is aligned to the Free State Growth and Development Strategy. This shall
happen in June as a fitting recognition of the 30th anniversary of the Soweto
Uprising. Furthermore my office will establish a coordinating unit that will
oversee the roll out of a comprehensive National Youth Service Programme as one
of our interventions to youth development.

We have to say however that the role of the Private sector in the production
of critical skills amongst our youth has not been very encouraging. Our plea is
that private sector companies should make available bursaries and other
resources to complement our own government bursary scheme as well as the
National Student Financial aid Scheme.

We would like to acknowledge and appreciate the contribution made by some
private sector companies in this regard and urge them to do more.

We appeal to companies to also adopt youth owned enterprises and initiate
voluntary training and mentoring programmes. Equally, we appeal to companies to
do more in absorbing more young people into learnership programmes.

Social and Human Development: A Better Life for all!!

Mr Speaker, honourable members, poverty eradication is one of the major
priorities of this ANC-led government. To this extent we are implementing a
number of social programmes that will provide a social safety net for the most
vulnerable in society.

We regard these challenges as our policy objectives that we have to tackle
through the Social and Human Development Cluster. I will deal briefly with
these issues in terms of what has been achieved so far and what still needs to
be done.

Safety net and Livelihood:

The major challenge remaining is the fragmented nature of funding for
poverty alleviation projects and obviously an integration of funding is
required in this regard.

We have made major strides with regard to the assistance we provide to needy
household through the food emergency scheme, the assistance to emerging farmers
through the comprehensive agricultural support programme as well as the
provision of social grants to those who qualify.

In order to deal with the challenges facing rural children transport to farm
school learners is operational in four districts and will be implemented in
Xhariep in this financial year. A total of 2 170 learners who walked distances
of between 15 to 21 kilometres to school are benefiting.

Supporting this initiative is the hostel accommodation programme for
learners from non-viable farm schools. A total of 1 011 learners have been
accommodated in seven such hostels in the 2005/06 financial year and four (4)
more hostels will become operational in this financial year.

The No Fees Schools will be introduced in the Free State in 2006 / 07.
Presentations are at an advanced stage and we will provide details and make
pronouncements on this matter.

The provincial government remains committed to extending free basic services
to those who qualify. In this regard, 2638 domestic households, 140 farm
workers houses and 40 schools will benefit from the Eskom Electrification
Programme. The free basic electricity rollout to 16 municipalities was
completed by the end of August 2005 benefiting about 77 000 families.

The extension of free water provision to rural and needy communities will be
completed during this financial year to those municipalities that are yet to
implement the programme.

Comprehensive Health Care Service:

As the African National Congress (ANC)-led government, mindful of the
importance of health in the lives of our people, we have accelerated the
provision of free basic health services to our people at all levels.

A Rural Health Plan was developed and implemented to mobilise resources in
rural areas. At present, a total of 104 mobile clinics render Primary Health
Care services in farming communities. Primary Health Care services are being
rendered in all the towns of the Free State. A total of 233 fixed clinics.

A comprehensive plan on care, treatment and management of HIV and AIDS has
been implemented and will be strengthened.

The number of anti-retroviral (ARV) sites has increased to 9 and these are
spread all over the five districts. The number of patients that have accessed
the programme is more than 11 000. Of these patients 4 229 from the department
of health and 279 from our social partners are placed on the ARV programme. Two
more additional treatment sites will be in the Lejweleputswa and Thabo
Mofutsanyana district municipality in the next financial year.

The programme is available in all five districts and covers 95% of all
towns. A total of 350 volunteers are involved in the provision of VCCT services
in the Free State. The programme will be rolled out to 100% of health
facilities during this financial year.

A regional office for the Khomanani Social Mobilisation Program was
established in Bloemfontein with sub-offices in Qwaqwa and Thaba
Nchu/Botshabelo.

In terms of the implementation of the National Tuberculosis (TB) strategy, a
focused intervention plan, which is targeted, will be implemented starting with
Fezile Dabi district that has been declared a high priority area. This will be
a community-based project with the involvement of all structures in TB
control.

The Free State School of Nursing has increased the new intake of students
from 160 in 2005 to 260 in 2006.This bring the total number of students at Free
State School of Nursing to 1010.

Housing and Human Settlement:

It is our view that housing provision is moving apace in the Province. Last
year alone, we managed to hand over 9 523 housing units to the beneficiaries.
In our endeavour to improve the livelihood of the rural poor in our province,
2000 houses were allocated in Maluti-a-Phofung and a 1000 in Thaba-Nchu.

In December 2005, an additional 7 900 subsidies were allocated to qualifying
developers in accordance with the grading adopted by the provincial government.
The deadline for completion and transfer of these houses to the beneficiaries
is the 31ST March 2006.

Honourable speaker, in recognition of the 16 days of no violence against
women and children, 16 units were allocated to women headed households. We want
to express our gratitude to all those who contributed to the success of this
project especially the contribution by First National Bank, the contractors and
the communities.

During this financial year, a further 12 000 housing units will be built,
thus giving effect to our commitment to the provision of adequate shelter to
those in need.

Honourable speaker, over a number of years we have all been haunted by a
number of unfinished housing projects throughout the province. We are happy to
report that on 30 September 2005; we launched a turn around strategy for all
incomplete RDP houses in the province. In the Xhariep district, a total of 153
units have already been completed and are ready for hand over to the
beneficiaries. The next phase of the project will be launched in the
Lejweleputswa within a fortnight and we hope to complete this project by the
end of the year in all the districts.

Integrated Sustainable Rural Development Plan (ISRDP):

The ISRDP is a ten-year programme to transform rural South Africa into
sustainable and economically viable communities.

For the year under review, we have achieved improved coordination and
integration of projects between government departments, state owned
enterprises, the private sector and the affected municipalities. This has
resulted in improved service delivery with regard to social infrastructure to
the communities.

Honourable speaker, agriculture is at the core of rural development. Hence,
we have invested massively in infrastructure support to emerging farmers
through initiatives such as Comprehensive Agriculture Support Programme (CASP)
Land Care, the Provincial Infrastructure Grant (PIG) and other forms of
assistance.

We will continue to support emerging farmers with mechanisation in the form
of implements and tractors, seeds and fertilisers, livestock and animal
vaccine.

Economic Growth, Investment and Job Creation: A Season of Hope!!

Honourable speaker, the national government has set broad economic targets
of increasing economic growth to above 6 percent by 2010 and halving
unemployment and poverty by 2014. It is the responsibility of our provincial
government to develop policies and strategies that will enable us to contribute
towards what President Mbeki described as the elaboration of “specific
interventions that will ensure that ASGI-SA, the Accelerated and Shared Growth
Initiative of South Africa, succeeds in its purposes, which include the
reduction of the unemployment levels.”

The Millennium Development Declaration through vision 2014 identifies the
following economic growth focussed developmental targets and objectives:

* Reduction of unemployment through creation of new jobs, inculcation of
skills and provision of support services to small, medium and micro enterprises
(SMMEs)
* Reduction of unemployment through stimulation of economic development

For our province, this implies a sustained economic growth of between six
(6) and seven (7) percent per annum up to 2014. This will be achieved through
investment in infrastructure development projects, empowerment of SMMEs and
skills development. This entails incorporation of programmes that will ensure
transfer of skills to all categories of labour to realise accelerated economic
growth and employment in the Province.

The objectives identified in our Growth and Development Strategy will enable
us to achieve the ambitious target we have set ourselves.

Honourable speaker, the hosting of the Provincial Investment Conference in
September last year laid a platform for increased investment opportunities in
the province. It has also resulted in the repositioning of the Free State
Development Corporation to enable it to fulfil its developmental mandate.

Working together with our social partners, the provincial government is now
better positioned to provide the much financial and non-financial support to
SMMEs and will focus on providing incentives at local government level to
enhance SMMEs. The repositioned Free State Development Corporation has been
mandated to develop appropriate funding models in an effort to address the
issues raised during the conference. We take this opportunity to congratulate
all distinguished individuals who have been appointed in our various boards and
we hope they will give their all in the service of the province.

In the last state of the province address, we explained the approach we will
follow in addressing the socio-economic challenges. We indicated that the
Economic, Employment and Investment Cluster would complete an extensive study
on the growth potential of towns in the province by the end of this financial
year. We also indicated that this cluster would be responsible for the
establishment of a chemical incubator by the end of November 2005.

The realisation of these goals depended largely on the full implementation
and use of both the Free State Growth and Development strategy and the
Provincial Spatial Development framework. The cluster reported in the recent
EXCO Lekgotla that the effective use of the spatial development framework still
remains a challenge to be addressed.

Honourable speaker, the lack of a coherent investment strategy has for a
long time hampered direct investment into the provincial economy. To this end,
we are happy to announce the establishment of an Investment Promotion Agency
through an amendment to the existing investment promotion act. The role of the
agency is to promote the province as a Premier investment destination. A few
bilateral agreements on trade and investment have already been explored in
conjunction with our missions abroad and the departments of trade and industry
and foreign affairs.

Tourism has been identified as one of the key economic growth drivers for
our province. As promised in the last state of the province address, the
Tourism Authority has now been established and the Tourism Investment Strategy
has been completed.

The declaration of the Vredefort Dome as a world heritage site was indeed a
defining moment for our tourism industry as well for the management of our
bio-diversity. It has improved our attractiveness as a trade and investment
destination. We will be preparing for a joint meeting between the Free State
and the North West Provinces led by the Premiers as part of the process of
developing an Integrated Management Plan for the Vredefort Dome.

Following our Infrastructure summit we have produced an infrastructure
blueprint for the province, which places greater emphasis on coordination and
massification in order to grow the economy and create jobs. In order to meet
this objective we have in this financial year increased our infrastructure
expenditure from 4% to 9% with a further growth to 10% during the MTEF
cycle.

Honourable speaker, the Free State is proud of its contribution to the
ASGI-SA programme, as spearheaded by the Deputy President. As we have indicated
the province has committed it self to growing the economy by six percent in
line with the national objectives. The Logistical Hub in Harrismith, which will
be linked to the cargo hub at the Johannesburg International Airport, has been
identified as one of ASGI-SA’s flagship projects. The second such project is
the production of bio-fuel from maize, which has already been approved by
cabinet and is ready for implementation. Both these projects will contribute
significantly to the attainment of the objectives of halving unemployment by
2014 and achieving the 6 percent economic growth.

In ensuring that the Free State SMMEs gain access to markets we have
facilitated their participation in platforms such as:

* Export Africa Exhibition
* SAITEX
* ITG Exhibition
* One of a Kind Exhibition

To further strengthen and coordinate our efforts aimed at supporting SMMEs
in the province, the cluster has convened a series of workshops to determine
the impact of procurement policies and practices of government departments and
their public entities on SMMEs.

Honourable speaker, the Expanded Public Works Programme will remain one of
our critical interventions in stimulating economic growth and reducing
unemployment levels. Already 10 034 jobs have been created in this programme
throughout the province. We intend to improve on this figure through better
coordination and monitoring.

Honourable speaker, all of the economic developmental initiatives we have
mentioned so far would by the end of this year created in excess of 50 000
jobs.

We have to indicate that these interventions do not reflect the totality of
our projected economic performance but that their impact will have multiplier
effects on other growth sectors of our economy. Indeed we have a reason to
believe that yesterday was another province and tomorrow represents the
brighter future.

A Safe and Secure environment, a fundamental human right for all!!

Honourable Speaker and Members, crime has the potential of undermining
government and community efforts to maximise social, economic and political
development of any society. Therefore, for our province to realise commendable
economic growth and development, safety and security must be prioritised. We
must therefore make a concerted effort to reduce the number of violent crimes,
crimes against women, children and the vulnerable in society. We need to
intensify our efforts to rooting corruption and fraud in both the public and
private sector.

As a responsive and caring government we listened and empathised with our
people, for example,

* When they said communities and municipalities must participate much more
effectively in community safety issues
* When they indicated that substance abuse was a worrisome youth
engagement
* When they refused to remain oblivious to the plight of children who are in
conflict with the law
*When they expressed their anger against rape and other forms of sexual
offences
* When they stated that victims of crime needed effective empowerment
* When they complained about shortage of police stations
* When they raised concerns about corruption

To this extent we rolled out a comprehensive strategic response which
amongst others has ensured that we:
* Embarked on a campaign to popularise the Service Charter for Victims of crime
within the province
* Convened an anti rape summit where an awareness and empowerment programme was
adopted
* Established victim support centres in Tshepong, Moroka Hospital, Botshabelo
hospital and Kopano Victim support centre in Welkom.

Our resolve to end all forms of violence perpetuated against women and
children remains unchanged. We will continuously make life difficult for
perpetrators of abuse and violence and make sure that they have no space in our
communities.

Equally, our commitment to protect and promote the rights of the disabled,
the elders and children will continue to constitute our day to day crusade in
building a province where all our people are equal.

Therefore, let us together make optimal use of February as the national
Safety and Security Month. We can use this month to assist the police by
reporting criminal activities in our communities as and when we become aware of
it.

Access to quality education

One of the flagship projects identified from the Free State Growth and
Development Strategy is the enhancement of knowledge-based economy. As a
province, we have taken drastic measures to ensure that access to education for
poorer learners is provided.

Access to quality of formal education will be improved in 2006/07 through
the provincial strategy to improve learning and teaching and the overall Grade
12 pass rate and exemptions. Even though our Grade 12 results have slightly
dropped, we intend to have an overall improvement of the quality of our
education focussing on all the grades. This shall mean improving our position
as the third highest in the country in terms of the overall results, and the
second highest in terms of quality. We will also give attention to the
recapitalisation of Further Education and Training (FET) Sector in line with
our skills development strategy.

We have increased allocation to Adult Basic Education and Training (ABET),
Learners with Special Education Needs (LSEN) and Early Childhood Development
(ECD) for pre Grade R. National School Nutrition Programme and learning support
project will be intensified.

Sports, Recreation, Arts and Culture:

Honoured guests, ladies and gentlemen, we are proud to announce that
Vodacompark was recently named as one of the 10 stadia that would host the 2010
Soccer World Cup. Preparations for the successful hosting of this prestigious
event are already under way. Additional budgetary allocations have been made
towards road, transport and stadium infrastructure. We are collaborating with
other stakeholders such as the hospitality industry and ACASA to enhance our
readiness to host the event.

Free State sporting fraternity is doing us all proud. We take this
opportunity of the State of the Province address to formally congratulate
Bloemfontein Celtics and Free State Stars for gaining promotion to the elite
PSL league. We also congratulate the Cheetahs for winning the Currie Cup,
Celtics for scooping the SAA Supa 8 trophy and the Free State Eagles for
winning the Standard Bank trophy two years in a row. We wish the Cheetahs the
best of luck in their match against the Blue Bulls tonight.

This achievement augurs well for our preparations of the 2006
Inter-Provincial sports tournament and the 2007 SA games, which we will be
hosting.

Macufe continues to grow from year to year and truly it is firmly
consolidating its position as one of the biggest arts and cultural eisteddfods
in the country. We are looking into ways of improving it even better such that
the economic benefits are much more tangible to especially benefit the Small
and Medium Enterprises.

Conclusion

Honourable Speaker I wish to inform this house that the Executive Council
will unveil a detailed Programme of Action for 2006, which will elaborate our
comprehensive programmes regarding:

* Accelerated Economic growth and development
* Job creation through massive infrastructure investment
* A comprehensive skills development programme focusing on especially youth and
women
* Improved Service delivery
* Capacity and financial viability of municipalities

We therefore call on all our people, our social partners, the parastatals
and the private sector to join our forward march to the consolidation of our
freedom and democracy. We have to unlock the creativity and energy of
collaboration and partnership because when all is said and done it is our
collective actions that shall mean a difference between a life of human
possibility or despair, clean or contaminated water, a shack or a real
dwelling, the freedom that comes with economic activity and a true escape from
joblessness and poverty or a life with no possibility at all.

Ladies and gentlemen we will continue to expand the frontiers of
international solidarity and friendship as we make friends with other
countries. This partnership is underpinned by our endeavour of positioning our
Province as the ultimate investment and tourism destination. Among such
initiatives is the generous support we receive from the Flemish government.
Through their financial and other assistance we have established four (4) SMME
support centres in Mangaung, Botshabelo, Thaba Nchu and Welkom.

Every international trip we undertake and every international friend we host
reinforce our principles of an equitable world order whilst at the same time it
opens enormous possibilities for our province and her people.

Equally, we will continue to mobilise our people to take serious the
processes of the African Peer Review Mechanism (APRM) currently guided by our
Provincial Governing Council. This process must help us inculcate a sense of
loyalty and pride in being Africans before we are South Africans, we are
Africans and we owe our being and heritage to Africa.

Mr Speaker, as we conclude we wish to salute the people of our province for
their resilience and their determination to make their Province a true
repository of the ideals of the Freedom Charter.

We wish to assure them today, that their contribution in shaping the
strategic direction of this province is immeasurable. We understand their
frustration sometimes when things do not go according to plan and we are
greatly inspired by their refusal to avail themselves as instruments of
political opportunists hell bent on derailing us from our national agenda.

Similarly, we wish to salute the great sons and daughters of this Province
who because of their untimely death cannot join us today. In the memory of Noby
Ngombane, Selebano Matlhape, Bazooka Mabaso and other great revolutionaries who
passed on, we will make sure that the precedence they and their fore bearers,
have set will be honoured. Their dedication to service, struggle and sacrifice
should become an inspiration to our cadres to be united in pursuit of a
people’s contract to create jobs and fight poverty.

Our people expect nothing but qualitative improvement of their lives borne
out of their struggle. To this extent we concur with our President during the
State of the Nation Address that:

“Clearly the masses of our people are convinced that our country has entered
into its age of hope. They believe that the country they love, their only
homeland, will not disappoint their expectations of an accelerated advance
towards the day when they will be liberated from the suffocating tentacles of
the legacy of colonialism and apartheid.”

The task we have set ourselves last year at this time constitutes the basis
for our assessment and evaluation. In terms of our own self-assessment we are
delighted to report that we have attained 82% of all the injunctions we have
set for ourselves in 2005. This score card is available on our website http://www.fspg.gov.za and we invite members of
the public to do their own evaluation. Whilst we are proud of our achievements
we are never the less mindful that a lot more still needs to be done.

For attaining this high rate of success I wish to thank the Executive
Council, the Speaker and members of the House, our Social Partners, Senior
management in government led by the Director General and all the dedicated
cadres of the public service who together with us are inspired by the belief
that everyday, every week and every month we are doing a little bit more to
strengthen the People’s contract to create work and fight poverty.

We are confident of our success. For today we are infantile dwarfs no more,
unable to think for ourselves, in animated fruit ready for the picking by
whosoever has sufficient strength. We are a force capable of uniting our people
in action to make real the ideals of the Freedom Charter in our lifetime!

We call on all our people to go out and vote. It is their right and it is
their responsibility.

Honourable Speaker, let the work begin and let the good times roll!

I thank you

Issued by: Office of the Premier, Free State Provincial Government
10 February 2006