Public Service and Administration, on the occasion of the launch of the State
Information Technology Agency (SITA) Walk in Centre in Rustenburg, North
West
25 May 2007
Acting Mayor A Mataboge,
Councillors,
Acting SITA CEO P Pedlar,
All protocol observed,
It is a great honour for me, and I am sure for many of you here today, to
launch yet another Walk in Training Centre. The launch coincides with a very
special day on the African calendar, the Africa Day. As we celebrate this
important day on our continent, we also need to reflect on the importance of
technology as a tool not only in skills development within the Public Service,
but also in introducing technology to our broader communities.
I am pleased to report that the Rustenburg Walk in Training Centre is the
third to be launched thus far, following the one opened in Nelspruit,
Mpumalanga and the other centre established in Bisho in the Eastern Cape. These
Walk in Training Centres are part of a broader strategy by the government of
the Republic of South Africa through SITA, to empower communities with basic
Information Technology (IT) skills.
As you might all appreciate, ladies and gentlemen, information technology is
one of the critical areas in modern day society in which South Africa has a
dire shortage of skills. It is an area that defines the developmental path of a
nation, whether it is a developed or developing nation. It is this area that
determines the fate of a country in view of its ability to take part in the
global knowledge economy and leverage the myriad resource and knowledge pool to
ensure its further development.
As I have indicated, our aim in introducing Walk in Training Centres is to
ensure that both public servants and the society at large are equipped with
valuable IT skills. To the public servants this forms part of our broad human
resources development strategy to empower public servants with computer skills
that would enable them to use computers to help people in accessing and using
government information and services on the portal.
As government endeavours to rigorously transform from the conventional
paper-based ways of delivering services, to the more sophisticated, faster,
highly efficient and cost-effective ICT based channels, we are going to need
the kind of public service cadre that is equipped with the requisite IT skills
to perform competitively in an IT environment.
Many of our people, particularly those in rural areas have been historically
isolated, both politically and economically and as a result had no access to
vital services such as water, healthcare, housing, education and the labour
market. Through the Walk in Training Centres, government is offering you an
opportunity to acquire IT skills so that instead of travelling long distances
to get services, you can are able to use computers in the multi-purpose
community centres to access government services and vital information to help
you make informed choices about your lives. In this way, you would be able to
participate and contribute meaningfully in the economy of the country.
The only way we as South Africans are to truly participate in the knowledge
economy, every effort must be made to prevent social exclusion. As our
President, Mr Thabo Mbeki has on several occasions so emphatically stated and I
quote: "We must continue the fight for liberation against poverty, against
underdevelopment, against marginalisation and information and communication
technology is a critically important tool in that struggle" (Imbizo for African
Youth, 2001).
We need to address the serious shortage of IT skills in the public sector.
This skills constraint has devastating consequences for government's efforts to
improve service delivery.
Like the rest of the world, we are making huge strides to leverage
information technology with all its advantages. In order to do so beyond simply
supplying the infrastructure and hardware, we have to empower our people with
the necessary skills to be able to use technology effectively. Given the rapid
development in Information and Communication Technology (ICT), the need for a
stringent focus on IT skills development cannot be overemphasised.
Government through SITA, is making available this facility to you so that
you can be trained in an assortment of IT courses that will enable you to work
effectively and smarter. We are trying to address the digital divide that has
for so long being a blemishing characteristic of our society.
This Walk in Training Centre has been established to give you, as public
servants, an opportunity to learn computer skills and improve your performance.
With this centre in operation, we are certain that the numerous computers with
which many offices in government are equipped will be put to good use for the
benefit of our citizens instead of playing solitaire.
We are moving away from a department or institution based mode of function
to a more integrated, seamless, single-window approach to service delivery. We
are cutting away the meandering bureaucratic red-tape and this would require
you to join in and play your part as an important link in the service delivery
chain.
You are all, I should think invariably familiar with the Gateway Project
that government runs. This is a classical example of a project that practically
demonstrates the sort of benefits that can be derived from optimally harnessing
ICTs in accelerating and improving service delivery. Simply put, the objectives
of the Gateway Project are to:
1. Make government information available online for easy citizen
access.
2. Enable citizens to easily interact with government from a single computer
either at home or in one of the many government established multi-purpose
community centres to obtain services, for example, forms.
3. Enable public servants to immediately obtain all necessary information and
documents from the various departments online without sending citizens from
department to department.
The Gateway Project represents a highly crucial synergy between the various
structures of government across the three spheres using ICT. In practical
terms, through information technology the Gateway Project allows public
servants unrestricted access to vital government information enabling them to
help citizens without sending them from pillar to post. This has far-reaching
positive consequences, particularly to the citizen. It saves time, money and
thus complements government's effort to stem out poverty.
Projects such as this require public servants to have the necessary skills
to help them operate computers to access and exchange and process information
for the benefit of our citizens. We are weary of the misconception that often
exists where IT is regarded as a means to an end in itself. Hence, we are
launching your Walk in Training Centre, today.
Walk in Training Centres are an important step towards addressing the dire
shortage of critical skills in government, particularly in critical areas of
service delivery. These Walk in Training Centres should be viewed within the
context of the Human Resource Development Strategy (HRDS) that our government
introduced in 2002. Its fundamental objective is to maximise people
development, management and empowerment through quality skills development to
accelerate transformation and service delivery that will benefit the people of
South Africa.
For this facility to be useful, we need positive buy-in from the provincial
government departments and the municipality. Departments, particularly at the
local sphere, should explore this opportunity of equipping their employees with
IT skills. The deficit of such skills is highly critical especially at local
level where the bulk of the services are delivered and officials have direct
day-to-day contact with community members. We would like to urge public
officials to proactively come forward and seize upon this opportunity to
empower yourselves.
As I indicated at the onset, this is the third Walk in Training Centre that
we are launching in the country and hopefully, there will be many more in the
future. We have been receiving positive feedback about how the other two,
namely one in Nelspruit and the other in Bisho are performing. We hope that
this Walk in Training Centre will live up to our expectations and train and
equip public officials in this municipality and province as a whole, with IT
skills to be able to perform in this age of technology.
Always remember that this facility will, if we are not vigilant and
supportive, become a white elephant, which will be a most unfortunate turn of
events, especially as we seek to permanently reverse the digital divide.
Thank you.
Issued by: Department of Public Service and Administration
25 May 2007
