Programme Director;
Education MEC, Ms Barbara Creecy,
The Acting Chief Executive Officer of the Gauteng City Region Academy,Sindiswa Lingela,
Wits University Vice Chancellor and Principal, Professor Loyiso Nongxa,
Top learners and their dedicated teachers from various schools,
Honourable guests,
Members of the media,
People of Gauteng,
Good day
Programme Director,
The year 2011 marks 35 years since school children from Soweto marched against the repressive apartheid regime in protest against the poor quality of education they were being forced to receive and particularly the decision by the racist National Party government to unilaterally use Afrikaans as a medium of instruction at African schools.
Their disgust at this inferior type of education was not borne overnight. Rather, it was a frustration Africans had been experiencing since 1910 when the white people declared the Union of South Africa. As the then President of the South African Native National Congress - the precursor to the African National Congress - Pixley ka Isaka Seme, said on January 8 1912:
"We have discovered that in the land of their birth, Africans are treated as hewers of wood and drawers of water." The youth of 1976 were also battling the very same philosophy that their forebears vowed to destroy at the beginning of the 1900s.
Importantly, both these different generations of heroes and heroines of our struggle for liberation realised that without decent education;
Africans will remain forever on the sidelines of development.
Programme Director
Since the dawn of our freedom, we as the ANC-led government have made great investments in the education of our young people. We have done this in keeping with the commitments and vision of great leaders who have come before us such as Seme, Solomon Plaatje and Chief Albert Luthuli - all of whom were great believers on education as a means to freedom. Our budgetary allocations on education since 1994 bear testimony to our allegiance to those principles.
As the American activist, children's advocate and educator, Marian Wright Edelman once said:
"Investing in [children] is not a national luxury or a national choice. It's a national necessity. If the foundation of your house is crumbling, you don't say you can't afford to fix it while you're building astronomically expensive fences to protect it from outside enemies. The issue is not are we going to pay -- it's are we going to pay now, up front, or are we going to pay a whole lot more later on."
Ladies and gentlemen,
I am sure that by now many of you are aware that we, as a province, are moving towards becoming a globally-competitive city region. This means that we intend to harmonise all our work so that when we compete for investments and business with established countries we are able to offer more value for money. We have already taken advice from Marian Wright Edelman and put our money where our mouths are.
A few years ago, we launched the Gauteng City Region Academy to assist us with skilling our residents so that we acquire the necessary skills to power our dream going forward. We further invested R30-million in the Gauteng City Region Observatory so that we have the latest possible data on what should be done to get Gauteng to become a globally competitive city region in the likes of Sao Paulo in Brazil, Hong Kong in China and others. It is important to note that all the cities we aspire to be like have one thing in common: a highly-skilled and highly educated workforce which can adapt to the demands of the modern global economy.
Programme Director,
We are very much aware that we still have a long way to go in ensuring that our people have the skills that are required by our economy. We know that we lack the required engineers. We know we are running short of accountants. And we are well-aware that we sorely need to boost our turnover of artisans.
It is a well-known fact that the high levels of poverty and escalating costs of living also contribute immensely towards denying our economy the relevant skills it requires. This vicious cycle - with poverty denying young people access to education and a lack of education denying young people the ability to smash the chains of poverty - is something we are working around the clock to break.
With many who manage to pass matric preoccupied with worries about their tuition fees and where their next meal is going to come from; it is clear that if we, as a caring government, do not intervene; we will not be able to build Gauteng into the province we want it to be.
It is against this background that today we, as the Gauteng Provincial Government, through the Gauteng City Region Academy, are awarding 1 050 bursaries to top learners from Quintiles 1, 2 and 3 schools (no fee paying schools). Furthermore, 500 bursaries have been allocated for artisanship and Further Education and Training colleges.
For this school calendar year (2011) we have set aside a budget of R58 million for bursaries, including bursaries for students at FET colleges who will receive an amount of R15 000 each. This is a milestone we should all be celebrating.
In addition to these bursaries that we are handing over here today, the Department of Education has also offered bursaries to all our top performing learners to study at any university of their choice. The Department also awarded bursaries to the two top performing learners in all 276 high schools participating in the Secondary School Improvement Programme (SSIP). Of course this can only happen in Gauteng because after all, "IT STARTS HERE!"
We hope and believe that this initiative will encourage the 'Class of 2011' to work harder to also become beneficiaries of this scheme. These bursaries demonstrate our commitment that; education, especially the education of the African Child, remains a key priority as we continue to transform our society and our economy.
By awarding these bursaries we want to strengthen our offensive on poverty, unemployment and social exclusion; by providing learners from disadvantaged communities with an opportunity to access quality education. We are making a worthy investment in the future of our country. This we are doing because we believe the youth are indeed the future of our country and our province.
On this important occasion, I would like, on behalf of the Gauteng Provincial Government, to congratulate all those learners who have received bursaries from the Gauteng City Region Academy Bursary Fund. Your success is a result of your hard work as well as the contribution of parents and teachers; to whom we are also grateful.
To all of our learners we say; well done and we wish you success in your chosen fields of study. We hope that you will take this opportunity provided to you by the government with both hands; that you will make a success of this opportunity for your benefit; the benefit of our province and the benefit of our country.
Upon successful completion of your studies, we look forward to your contribution towards ongoing efforts to build Gauteng into a globally-competitive city-region.
In addition, I would like to commend the Department of Education for its commitment in assisting learners to make the transition from the world of schooling to the world of further and higher education.
Programme Director,
In conclusion, it is worth noting that Gauteng has for the first time achieved the best matric marks in the country receiving a pass rate 78.6%. Some 43% of matriculants in the province obtained a university entrance pass. The hard work of all relevant stakeholders such as the department of education, school governing bodies, parents and relevant community based organisations and our learners paid off. No more are our peopleexpected to be hewers of wood and carriers of water. The Gauteng City Region Academy Bursary Fund will go a long way in ensuring that.
I thank you!
For more information contact:
Sipho Mokoena
Cell: 082 566 0515
Source: SAPA
