P Mlambo-Ngcuka: Launch of SuperSport Executive Sports Management
Programme

11 May 2006

Minister of Sport, Makhenkesi Stofile,
Deputy Minister of Sport, Gert Oosthuizen,
Gauteng MEC for Sports, Arts and Recreation, Barbara Creecy,
Members of parliament,
Vice Chancellor of Wits, Prof Loyiso Nongxa,
Chief Executive Officer of Naspers, Koos Bekker,
Chief Executive Officer of SuperSport, Imtiaz Patel,
Director-General of Sport, Denver Hendricks,
SASCOC President, Moss Mashishi,
Distinguished guests,
Leaders of business, sport and the media,
Ladies and gentlemen

This week our country celebrated 10 years since the adoption of the first
democratic Constitution in our history. It was this Constitution which ushered
in a new era in our country and ensured that our people enjoyed all the basic
rights as stipulated in the Constitution. Among the rights that the
Constitution guaranteed was that: "Everyone has the right to freedom of
expression, which includes freedom of artistic creativity". Sporting activities
and expression are firmly located here.

Sport in our country has historically played a crucial role in the struggle
for liberation. In the dark days of apartheid our people declared that there
could be "no normal sport in an abnormal society."

In that way sport became a major instrument in the struggle to isolate
apartheid. It was also a major tool used by the liberation movement in the
isolation of the apartheid regime through the sports boycott campaign in which
many of our people participated.

Since the liberation of our country in 1994 sport has also played an
instrumental role in ensuring that it is an active participant in the
reconstruction and development of our society towards a truly non-racial,
non-sexist and democratic society.

Among other things, sport has played an instrumental role in fostering a
spirit of nation building and enhancing reconciliation by building and
nurturing the spirit of patriotism and pride for our country. Perhaps, more
than any other sector, sport has contributed immensely in ensuring that the
majority of our people identify with their national symbols and colours and
develop a particular pride around our national symbols like the national flag
and national anthem.

We can never forget the spirit, euphoria and pride that were generated by
the successes of our national teams when our rugby team Amabhokobhoko won the
1995 World Cup and our national soccer team Bafana-Bafana won the African Cup
of Nations in 1996.

When two of our athletes Penny Heyns and Josiah Thugwane excelled during the
Atlanta Olympic Games in 1996 by winning gold medals our hearts felt like
exploding with pride and joy. Those were the early days when our country first
entered the international community of nations and sport played an instrumental
role in projecting our nation as a winning nation.

Those were the defining moments for our young democracy.

They were the special moments in the life of our young nation and a nascent
democracy that showed South Africans as a people who were truly uniting. Sport
clearly played a unifying role for the people of South Africa.

Sport is also one of the sectors which employs large anumbersof talented
young people, mostly from underprivileged backgrounds, and thus provides them
with an opportunity to move out of poverty through the use of their talents. So
the role that sport plays in the economy is also crucial.

As many teams in the sporting field become more professional and are run
along business lines, even more employment opportunities are created in various
sporting codes for young people to explore and to participate in.

Our role as government is mainly that of ensuring that the playing fields,
physically and metaphorically, in all sporting codes are levelled so that every
South African who is talented can actively participate in sport. Our role is
that of ensuring that we facilitate access of all our people in the different
sporting codes. We owe that absolute commitment to all those who struggled and
suffered so that we as a uniting nation could unveil our democratic
Constitution 10 years ago.

It is for this reason that when we are with people in the sports sector we
always encourage them to ensure that access is broadened so that all our young
people can have a chance to compete equally.

This must be done with a view to ensuring that the demographic
representation of the country is reflected in all the sporting codes.

Our role as government is also mainly concentrated on the encouragement of
the development of sport at grass roots level. We would like to see a situation
in future where all young people can participate equally and competitively in
all the sporting codes that are available regardless of their race, class or
gender.

Since the democratic dispensation, our government has moved with speed in
the development of sporting infrastructure and sporting facilities in all
areas, especially in townships and rural areas so that we can enhance the
development of sport in all corners of our country.

I was therefore thrilled when a few days after the public launch of the
Joint Initiative on Priority Skills Acquisition (JIPSA) in March, I received
information that SuperSport and Wits Business School were collaborating in
extending the skills drive in our country and more particularly in sport.

Here was business and education combining their collective efforts to give
concrete effect to JIPSA. I invited SuperSport's CEO, Imtiaz Patel, to visit me
in an attempt to understand how the Executive Sports Management Programme that
we are launching today fits in with the skills revolution that we have embarked
on.

I am of the opinion that this initiative by SuperSport should be supported
and that ways should be explored as to how the executive management programme
aimed at the senior levels of sport administrators could benefit not only
achieving excellence in sport but also those, especially youth, who find
themselves in the Second Economy. It just made good sense that such a programme
should cascade down to lower levels where the needs of the skills drive are the
greatest.

A working group has been established under the Tourism, Hospitality and
Sport Education and Training Authority (Theta) to consider the integration of
sports related programmes that relate directly to the objectives of the
Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative for South Africa (AsgiSA).

Amongst other things this working group will explore the introduction and
co-ordination of mentorship and training programmes. They will put in place
exit opportunities for those completing training programmes, all aimed at
complementing the objectives of JIPSA.

It is such initiatives that give us confidence that we will succeed in our
efforts to use JIPSA as the driving force in meeting the targets of the
AsgiSA.

It is my contention that this programme and sport in general could be the
vanguard of what we want to achieve with JIPSA.

While sport is still greatly dependent on volunteers, the shift in world
sport has resulted in increased reliance on both professional and technical
skills.

The 2010 FIFA World Cup that we will be hosting will require a degree of
professionalism that will far surpass anything that we have done thus far in
the organisation of sport. It will be a new benchmark of excellence for us to
achieve.

It is an opportunity that we cannot allow to slip through our fingers.

Every aspect of our lives is touched by the scarcity of skills. Sport is no
different. And sport can show the way. The imminence of 2010 is the spur to
this end.

In fact Department of Sport and Recreation, as a national government
department, has in its White Paper identified two priorities if we are to
succeed in broadening our sports base and improving our chances of success
internationally. Those priorities are developing the human resource potential
needed to manage and administer sport and improving the governance of our
sport.

Our nation's strength lies in co-operation between public and private
sectors. It makes good sense for government to partner SuperSport in this
programme and the collaboration is aptly demonstrated by the fact that Minister
Stofile is the patron of the programme. Already SuperSport and the Department
are working together on government's mass participation programme through the
Siyadlala/Let's Play drive.

This is aimed at ensuring that our communities develop active lifestyles
through participating in sport. An outcome of this campaign is that millions of
our young people, especially women and rural youth, will become actively
involved in sport allowing their talents to be channelled into the competitive
areas of sport. Those splendid and neglected South Africans with the necessary
dedication and talent are out there, also in the remotest hamlets and we shall
hear all about them as they take their rightful place in sport.

This means that we would need greater numbers of highly trained and skilled
administrators to deal with increased numbers of participants.

It presents great potential for job opportunities not only as professional
athletes but also as highly skilled administrators, whether as managers of
athletes and facilities or as coaches and trainers.

It also creates vast opportunities in the hospitality and sports tourism
industry. We have not yet scratched the surface in realising the economic
potential that properly arranged and sustainable sport organisation holds for
us.

The skills challenge is the single biggest factor militating against
fighting poverty and unemployment. If we do not succeed in the skills
revolution, we could be unleashing the most serious potential threat to
stability and economic growth. This is something that we as a nation cannot
afford.

I am greatly encouraged by what SuperSport has decided to embark upon. The
challenge now is for hundreds of other companies in their specific industries
to follow in these footsteps.

We welcome the investment of six million rands over the next three years by
SuperSport to train in excess of 70 senior administrators. That is JIPSA in
action! It is through equipping all South Africans with skills for the market
place that we will cement and boost a competitive economy that serves all our
citizens.

I applaud SuperSport on this initiative and its contribution and the
collaboration with the Wits Business School in ensuring that we work together
to build our capacity ahead of the 2010 Soccer World Cup. Let this be one of
many interventions in which you make a difference in the exciting industry in
which you operate and do your business.

In conclusion, allow me to express my deepest condolences to the family and
friends of Patrick "Ace" Ntsoelengoe, who passed away this week. Ace was truly
a legend of South African soccer and a positive role model and inspiration for
many of our people especially the youth. We say to his family and to soccer
lovers: may his soul rest in peace; we will always remember his contribution to
the development of sport in our country.

I thank you.

Issued by: The Presidency
11 May 2006
Source: SAPA