Programme directors
Deputy Minister of Transport Mr Jeremy Cronin
Members of Parliament and Provincial Legislatures
MECs of Roads and Transport
Mayors and councillors
Amakhosi and Traditional Leaders Present
Director-General and Heads of Department
CEOs of our Transport Agencies
Established contractors
Emerging contractors
Members of the media
Ladies and gentlemen
We meet here today in the province of KwaZulu-Natal as the transport family - the national Department of Transport, all 9 provincial departments responsible for roads and transport, local government including district and local municipalities, public transport passenger associations, road transport forums, established contractors, emerging contractors, Zibambele-Siyatentela and similar formations, engineers, AmaKhosi and Road Safety Councils.
In the past one and a half decade much has been achieved in the democratisation of our country. But none of us has any illusion that to address hundreds of years of underdevelopment would take quick-fix solutions. We are making commendable progress, however in spite of this we all agree that the pace must be accelerated.
Defining community roads access needs
In a study commissioned by ourselves in 1996/97 called the Community Access Roads Needs Study (CARNS) and authored by the best available planners, engineers and development specialists, in KwaZulu-Natal alone we identified 11 475km of roads that needed to be built. This was in order to give communities access to schools, clinics, community centres and places of economic activity. This was one of the key pioneering initiatives that gave expression to our commitment to achieving social equity and access, under the democratic dispensation.
In order to address these backlogs that were identified through the CARNS study, we developed an implementation strategy and called it the “Road to Wealth and Job-Creation”. Through the implementation of this strategy we wanted to economically empower communities that were previously marginalised.
- We established the Emerging Contractor Programme called Vukuzakhe to construct the 11 475 km access roads backlog in KwaZulu-Natal
- We went on to initiate Zibambele, focusing on the participation of women in road maintenance, having realised the central importance of women empowerment, particularly rural women, in achieving socio-economic progress.
What the CARNS study showed was a provincial image that mirrored the rest of the country with its two extremes - on one hand it showed communities with a modern infrastructure, clean water, paved and tarred roads and information communications technology (ICT). On the other hand, it showed communities which were under-developed; were characterized by extreme poverty and lacked access to decent infrastructure such as water, roads, electricity and ICT.
For this reason, in the “Road to Wealth and Job-Creation”, when we spoke of poverty, we understood it in two ways: Firstly, that there are poor, destitute individuals, who are never sure of where their next meal will come from. This constitutes the majority of our population. The second is that there are poor communities. In the first decade and a half of our democracy we have had a lot of priorities. This has included attending to the indigent, children, orphans, the disabled, elderly and the unemployed.
By now it has become evident that we must address the general poverty of communities. Historically, the poor have escaped the all-encompassing scourge of underdevelopment in their areas by means of internal migration to areas that were seen as developed. Besides resulting in over-populated urban centres, this trend has also robbed rural areas of development activists.
This is a trend to confront and to change for the good of our country. Our event today is about refocusing our energies as a sector on empowering resource- and infrastructure-poor communities and empowering the residents of those areas in a lasting and meaningful way.
Unveiling S’hamba Sonke
Ten years after the CARNS study and the Road to Wealth and Job Creation report, the transport family adopted the Road Infrastructure Strategic Framework for South Africa (RISFSA). RISFSA was led by the national department together with the provinces to identify and to establish uniformity in the development and management of road infrastructure in South Africa. South Africa’s road network comprises some 750 000km, 593 000kms of which is gravel network managed by our provinces, metros and municipalities. About 154 000kms is paved and managed across all spheres and 140 000kms of the network is still to be proclaimed.
Proclamation means that a specific authority of government takes ownership and by extension takes responsibility for the maintenance of that network. When a road is unproclaimed no roads authority among the spheres of our government takes responsibility for its upkeep, even for minimal maintenance including putting up signage.
For our provinces, municipalities - indeed for our entire transport sector - having unproclaimed roads has a similar effect as having an undercount in the census. A province that has unproclaimed roads does not get the correct allocation that is due to it under the Division of Revenue Act (DORA).
Most of our road network has long exceeded its design-life. Our network has reached a state of disrepair. In our budget speech last year we called for a 60/40 split where 60% is for maintenance and 40% is for any new capital expenditure work.
This is an issue that has been raised by successive Ministers of Transport who wanted to address our historical underinvestment inroad maintenance - warning that failure to spend on road maintenance would, in time cost the country more in the replacement and rebuilding of the network.
Since 2009 we have lobbied for a dedicated investment that would deal with the maintenance backlogs in our secondary road network. In our efforts we have approached President Zuma and the Minister of Finance for dedicated funding for road maintenance.
Ladies and gentlemen today we unveil the fruit of our collective labour and efforts which has finally borne fruit with the launch of S’hamba Sonke. Our collective success starts this financial year with an amount of R6.4 billion, R7.5 billion next financial year and R8.2 billion by 2014. It will total some R22 billion by 2014. For the first time in the history of this country, this entire amount is ring- fenced for the maintenance of our roads. The provincial roads maintenance grant is a conditional grant dedicated to road maintenance.
For the 2011/12 financial year this money is allocated as follows:
- KwaZulu-Natal: R1.2 billion
- Eastern Cape: R1 billion
- Mpumalanga: R1 billion
- Limpopo: R934 million
- Gauteng: R566 million
- Free State: R447 million
- Western Cape: R411 million
- Northern Cape: 308 million
- North West: R501 million.
Provincial anchor projects:
It is useful to highlight some of the key projects provinces have targeted in response to the S’hamba Sonke programme framework. In support of S’hamba Sonke KwaZulu-Natal, our hosts today have identified the following anchor road projects:
- Nongoma – Dabhazi – Hlambanyathi - Hlabisa Corridor at R270 million
- Eshowe – Ntumeni – Kranskop – Vryheid corridor at R2 billion.
These anchor projects will support the tale of four cities which is about connecting Ulundi, Richards Bay, Pietermaritzburg and Durban. Similar programmes are being rolled out by the other eight provinces in support of S’hamba Sonke. It is useful to highlight some of the key projects provinces have targeted in response to the S’hamba Sonke Programme framework.
Mpumalanga
- Maintenance of the R33 Road between Stoffberg to Belfast (42km) at a cost of R 24 million
- An upgrade 40km road project from White River to Ntsikazi at a cost of some R16 million
Limpopo
- Household routine maintenance engaging some 27 contractors for some R237 million and attending to some 8100 km
- Fixing access roads at a cost of R60 million
- Pothole patching project on some 220kms of roads at cost of R174 million.
Gauteng
- Reseal on N14 from Krugersdorp to Klieveskraal at a cost of R55.8 million
- Reseal of Ben Schoeman - Pretoria to the N1 for R10 million
- Upgrade on P126 (M1) on some 8.54km for R11 million.
Northern Cape
- Household Road Maintenance- Bathloaros to Maphinik 26km for R7 million
- Road Maintenance: Victoria West Calvinia 387km for R18 million
- Re-seal of Douglas-Kimberley 18km for R22 million.
Western Cape
- Overberg regravelling at R43 million
- Malmisbury to Hopefield reseal for R51 million
- De Rust to N9 reseal for R54 million.
Eastern Cape
- Household Contractor programme approximately R200 million over three years
- Emerging contractor and consultant development for R500 million over three years.
This is by no means an exhaustive list of the S'hamba Sonke activities for this financial year, but one that gives us an indication that work has started in earnest and the entire budget of R6.4bn for this year will be spent, all of it.
Monitoring delivery
In this regard as a national department we will have completed the establishment of the project management unit by the end April 2011. Provinces have been asked to establish their project management units by the end of May.
They will report regularly on the implementation of S’hamba Sonke. All provinces are expected to report to the national Department of Transport every month. Our department is required to regularly report on a quarterly basis to National Treasury on the performance of this grant.
We will monitor the creation of jobs and expenditure to ensure emerging contractors are created in numbers. The transport forums will become another layer of civil society which will contribute to the monitoring and evaluation of S’hamba Sonke.
Infrastructure defines development
The most visible characteristic of a developed country is that its infrastructure must be developed. The most critical factors to development are water, energy, roads as we well as ICT. Today’s gathering is about a better life for all. The call for a better life has meaning when it is a better life for all. A better life wherever you are.
A better life for all requires freedom of movement for all. Freedom of movement for all requires roads for all. The World Bank has placed infrastructure as a necessary condition for funding and investment in a country.
You cannot qualify even as a beggar nation if road construction and maintenance is not part of your plan. You do not qualify even as a beggar nation if you are wanting in infrastructure.
It is here that Africa in general and South African Development Community (SADC) in particular are found most wanting. It is here where the dividing line between developed
South Africa mostly urban and underdeveloped South Africa mostly rural and African in particular is located. It is here where we find that our colonialism of a special type finds its clearest expression. Overcoming the continent’s infrastructure deficit is at the heart of Africa’s development plan, the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD).
The blueprint emphasises regional planning for new infrastructure projects with the goal of allowing goods, people and information to move efficiently and freely throughout the continent. S’hamba Sonke will create 70 000 jobs in 2011/12.
A key element of S’hamba Sonke is ongoing stakeholder consultation in all projects and programmes which will be articulated in the following forums:
- (Rural) Road Transport Forums, where they do not exist, must be formed
- Strong stakeholder institutions for the economic empowerment of South Africa’s rural poor must be rolled out
- Commitment to the development of a national co-operative movement and a national emerging contractor council.
Furthermore, S’hamba Sonke consists of the following elements:
- A Pothole Repair Programme, involving road-users and the private sector
- The establishment of provincial road-asset registers which record the condition of roads, traffic counts and life-cycle maintenance requirements
- Asset management systems for authorities to “know your network.” Engineers and Superintendents will drive through stretches of road to determine the daily condition of our road network
- Reducing the percentage of roads in poor to very poor condition from the current 30% to 10%
- Reducing vehicle operating costs and thus overall transportation costs.
We are pleased S’hamba Sonke will become a truly national programme and one to be implemented through active management of MECs and their Heads of Department.
Anchor programme for S’hamba Sonke
Ladies and gentlemen, as part of S’hamba Sonke:
- Road engineers and superintendents will be deployed all over the network with the responsibility to identify potholes and implement infrastructure maintenance
- They will be charged with driving through stretches of road repeatedly in order to determine the daily condition of the road network thereby assisting with early identification and repair of potholes
- The project management unit at national Department of Transport with similar structures in provinces.
We must recall that even when we started the programme in KwaZulu-Natal, we also had borrowed these ideas from Kenya and we developed them into a successful programme. Maybe S’hamba Sonke will find more creative implementation in Limpopo, may be in the Free State.
We shall become a developed state. If you are not fired with enthusiasm, you will be fired with enthusiasm! Other areas of job-creation include a national road beautification programme which will be related to rigorous law enforcement. Grass-cutting on our network, regular and routine maintenance will form the core of our job-creation programme.
No doubt, we expect S’hamba Sonke which seeks to provide rural access and urban mobility, will surpass the achievements of ARRUP (Zibambele and Vukuzakhe) and similar programmes such as Siyatentela (Mpumalanga), Gondu Lashu (Limpopo) and Siyakha (Gauteng) among others, combined. Ladies and gentlemen, because of S’hamba Sonke South Africa’s roads shall never be the same again.
Road beautification
Road beautification across our country, especially on our national and major provincial roads and approaches to cities, will be embarked upon. Constructing spaces for relaxation, traffic calming, planting, flowering, shrubbing will translate into a significant number of jobs at a local level in relation to maintenance. In relation to this, we expect our local municipalities and law enforcement officials to enforce the relevant laws and by-laws.
Road safety
On Thursday we close for Easter weekend, Freedom Day and Workers Day until 2 May 2011. We have just come back from London where we were invited as speaker at the launch of the United Nations Time for Action, Decade of Action for Road Safety 2011-2020. We were painfully reminded that as we began the 2010 FIFA World Cup, the great granddaughter of our icon former President Nelson Mandela was killed in a car crash as she was returning from the opening concert of the World Cup.
We resolved to strengthen the now world-admired National Rolling Enforcement Plan (NREP). From 1 October 2010 we resolved to stop at least 1 million vehicles per month. To date, more than 5 million motor vehicles have been stopped and checked.
Even as we build new roads we shall redouble our efforts to make our roads safe. It is Time for Action! The entire focus of our nation in the area of mobilising our communities towards a single goal is upon us.
That goal is improving safety of our communities as we improve the state of our roads. This is a task on which we dare not falter. We are the sector with the biggest possibility to contribute to job-creation in many direct and indirect ways but only if we act with a single purpose across our spheres.
In this regard, we draw inspiration from the Bible in the Book of Hebrews 12:1 where we are called to action, a call that is relevant as we embark on implementing S’hamba Sonke today and I quote: “Since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses; Let us throw off every hindrance and sin that easily entangles and let us run with perseverance the race made out for us “ Timothy 2:5 “And also if anyone competes in athletics he is not crowned unless he competes according to the rules”. The rules for us in serving our people are according to the Public Finance Management Act (PFMA). And the rules for us are clear, our people first.
We serve our people with integrity, honesty and according to the PFMA. We can thus announce that we will later this year introduce the Transport Sector Awards, key among which will be the focus on the S’hamba Sonke Programme.
These awards are aimed at fostering best-practice across our sector and also to improve the benefits that accrue to poor communities as a result of S’hamba Sonke. These Awards will ensure that S’hamba Sonke becomes not only a run-away success but that it is seen to be a run- away success by the whole country.
The awards are informed by our belief that one cannot spend R22 billion quietly but that we must do so watched by the whole country and the intended beneficiaries of our S’hamba Sonke programme.
S’hamba Sonke!
Re sepela ka moka!
Re tsamaya rotlhe!
Re tsamaya ka o fela
Ons loop saam!
Vamos juntos!
Building together!
Thank you!
