Executive Mayor of the Amathole district municipality, Mr Somyo
Members of the Executive Council among us
Mayors and councillors from the various municipalities
Leaders in government
Representatives from faith based organisations (FBOs) and our honoured guests, the Youth of the Eastern Cape province
Ndiyanibulisa nonke and I hope that you can feel that the 2010 FIFA World Cup is here.
Before I go any further, I would like to wish our national team, Bafana-Bafana well in today's fixture against Uruguay. Today I will not be as bold as I was last week and predict a score, but I am quite confident that we are to collect our first three points, if last week's performance is anything to go by.
Ladies and gentlemen, if we were to scrutinise and appreciate the enormous responsibility that rests with the 11 young men that are to enter the field today carrying the hopes and aspirations of the South African nation and the African continent so hungry for champions, no one would negate the importance of youth in our advancement.
Today we remember that it was on 16 June 1976, when multitudes of South African youth emerged from township school classrooms to confront a brutal system of racial oppression universally condemned as "a crime against humanity".
Propelled by the basic human urge for freedom, young men and women took to the streets to show their discontent with the apartheid system and its laws specifically the Afrikaans Medium Decree of 1974 which forced all black schools to use Afrikaans and English in a 50 to 50 mix as languages of instruction.
History tells us that the Regional Director of Bantu Education (Northern Transvaal region), JG Erasmus, told circuit inspectors and principals of schools that from 1 January 1975, Afrikaans had to be used for mathematics, arithmetic, and social studies from standard five (seventh grade), according to the Afrikaans Medium Decree; English would be the medium of instruction for general science and practical subjects (home craft, needlework, woodwork, metalwork, art, agricultural science).
Indigenous languages would be used for religion instruction, music and physical culture. This decision was binding despite a 1972 poll having found that 98 percent of young Sowetans did not want to be taught in Afrikaans.
As we gather here, 34 years on, reflecting on events that led to the 1976 riots, celebrating the lives of young activists who hurled themselves at the crushing force of apartheid, we remember that they unlocked a wave of human energy unequalled in the history of our country.
As we look back at that era we can, with hindsight, confidently say the June '76 generation ably responded to the imperatives of their time. Indeed we can, aided by the vantage of history, state that the '76 generation defined for itself its life purpose and set about fulfilling it.
Having defeated the beastly apartheid 16 years ago, the context in 2010 is completely different, but as a people we are still challenged. The issue of language has still not escaped us, and before I make my input in that regard I would like to dare the current generation of youth to openly debate and be active participants in addressing challenges of
HIV and AIDS, teenage pregnancies, drug and alcohol abuse as well as the deepening of democracy in our country.
Today, I call upon you, the youth of the Eastern Cape to lead the processes that talks to nation building and define the kind of society we want to see. If one was to do an audit of all our liberation movement stalwarts, one would discover that they made their most significant contribution to our struggle for freedom in their youth.
The likes of OR Tambo, Walter Sisulu, Nelson Mandela, Walter Sisulu, Winnie Madikizela Mandela, Robert Mangaliso Sobukwe, Chris Hani, Steve Biko, to mention but a few, at the time they committed to the struggle, they were young people who had to do all the things that young people had to do.
However, they knew that there was a greater cause and sacrificed their youth and all it promised to ensure that scores of South African people enjoy the freedom that you and I enjoy today.
The magnitude of the challenges of their time and the inherent risks were incomparable. It was at the helm of the apartheid in the 1940s to the 1970s with the Nationalist Party doing whatever it could to assert itself when instead of retiring to enclaves of the elite educated middle class, our struggle icons vigorously committed to the goal of the national democratic revolution.
Today should be a day of reflection where we ask ourselves questions about where we are falling short. Only 16 years into our democracy, the commitment to the broader humanitarian cause no longer exists.
Could our problem be that we have taken our freedom and civilisation beyond who we are?
We have become colonies ourselves to materialism and associated ills. This has led to the weakening of our values and our social fibre in that, people are prone to corruption and lack ubuntu, a basic trait that defined us as Africans.
Our loss of identity can be seen in our homes where one is no longer frowned upon for receiving guests and letting them leave without having offered them even a glass of water. In my eyes as an African, that is wrong and in today's language, it is just not Ayoba!
Our humanity as Africans was such that, a traveller passing through your village, when he stopped at your homestead to ask for water, he would be given amarhewu instead. Because of its nourishing value, this drink would not only address the thirst of the traveller, but the hunger as well.
Paying for everything in modern times has made us to become materialistic and individualistic with our values of ubuntu quickly disappearing.
Masingalahlekelwa ziintloni, let us not allow erosion of the essence of who we are as Africans prosper. Our African values as espoused by our struggle icons should overcome.
It is important for us to remember that there is no quick way to acquire wealth. If we want our democracy to prosper, if we aspire to riches there is no better way to them than working hard.
Nelson Mandela, having qualified as a lawyer was never consumed by materialism. While he could have chosen to just practice and forget the world around him, his strong grounding in community values made him see that there were those who were less fortunate than him and felt it necessary to make himself part of the poor and serve their needs.
As we set the debate for discussion for youth for the next 12 months, I call on all you, young people, to engage with the use of your mother tongues, specifically as a medium of instruction at schools.
As the Eastern Cape provincial government, given the high matric failure rate by learners we view as capable, we would like to challenge our youth to follow on the footsteps of the 1976 generation and begin to interrogate the appropriateness of the use of other languages as a medium of instruction in their schools instead of their mother tongue.
Today let us vow to strengthen debate on use of home language as a medium of instruction at schools as opposed to English. Use of foreign languages and allowing them to be dominant over our own languages is indicative of the negative legacies of apartheid.
The argument that English is an international language for commerce no longer holds. The prevalence of use of foreign languages is dominant in former colonies like South Africa.
First world countries like Germany, France, Switzerland and many others use their native tongues and yet their levels of development and functionality are superb.
They are not excluded from international activities and discourse, as we are made to believe we would be if we insist on this, instead their levels of reasoning and participation is elevated.
As the apartheid government used language as an instrument of dominance and oppression, let us use it to liberate ourselves from its remnants.
As the Eastern Cape provincial government, we are of the contention that our country's reconstruction and development efforts should be underwritten by active involvement of our youth in moral regeneration efforts and supporting government programmes that are geared to fighting poverty, illiteracy, unemployment and crime.
There is no better vehicle to communicate our values and aspirations than our own languages. They will assist us to fulfil the dreams of a better life for all and better address in our schools challenges that relate to learning and better comprehension of the syllabus.
As the Eastern Cape provincial government, we are aware that we need to accelerate our own provincial efforts towards the development and empowerment of our youth.
This current financial year, the Office of the Premier is establishing the youth desk which will be looking at youth development in the province, following the dissolution of the Eastern Cape Youth Commission and the establishment of the National Youth Development Agency (NYDA).
For this reason, among other things, the Office of the Premier has a financial assistance programme targeting needy university students, and bursaries provided by the provincial government in preparing these young people to be better leaders of tomorrow.
During this 2010 FIFA Soccer World Cup tournament we encourage all of you young people to give a warm welcome to the visitors, promote and participate in the related events and give support to the national team.
There are public viewing areas in the province that young people must use, have fun and enjoy this historic event responsibly.
Having gone to elections last year and having voted you might be interested to know how we have translated the promises outlined in the African National Congress manifesto into action.
Through our provincial strategic framework, we identified 10 key outcomes, which in my view should mainly benefit the youth. These are:
* decent employment through inclusive economic growth
* an efficient, competitive and responsive economic infrastructure network
* sustainable human settlements and improved quality of household life
* vibrant, equitable, sustainable rural communities contributing towards food security for all
* quality basic education
* skilled and capable workforce to support an inclusive growth path
* a long and healthy life for all South Africans
* all people in the province are and feel safe
* a responsive, accountable, effective and efficient local government system
* an efficient, effective and development oriented public service and an empowered, fair and inclusive citizenship.
These will be achieved through the provincial priority areas of which I will only tackle the issues that relate to the youth sector:
Speeding up growth and transforming the economy to create decent work and sustainable livelihoods. The work needed to be undertaken through this priority therefore includes these goals for 2010/11:
* Protecting, expanding and diversifying the industrial base of the province to create decent employment, with an increasing emphasis on youth employment by:
(a) ensuring the effective and efficient implementation of the provincial industrial development strategy
(b) developing and implementing a plan to manage excess capacity in the manufacturing sector
(c) Locating the Eastern Cape provincial government as the centre for economic thinking, planning and policy development in the province.
* Implementation of the second Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP2) and National Youth Service to create decent employment which is the:
(a) Extended Public Works Programme target of 2010/11 of creating 64 593 job opportunities.
Knowing that we have a significant number of our youth working as entrepreneurs, the provincial government will support supplier development as part of supply chain management, and government will:
* Review procurement policies in order to promote cooperatives and small, medium and micro enterprises (SMMEs). This will include putting in place mechanisms to deal with corruption in procurement processes, particularly with respect to conflict of interest by officials
* The province will also improve procurement processes to ensure timely payment of suppliers. Notwithstanding our current fiscal constraints, the province will ensure that all departments pay service providers within the regulatory 30 days
* Local and regional economic development initiatives will be aligned with government programmes by creating and facilitating an enabling environment for the implementation and support to SMME development.
Ladies and gentlemen, there is a lot to tell but the time is limited.
As I conclude, however, I would like to encourage our youth to emulate the past generations of young lions who gave up their lives to ensuring that we enjoy the democracy we now enjoy.
I encourage you to be active participants in all structures of governance from school governing bodies to contributing in the policy development framework of government. I call on you to be active members of progressive organisations in your communities so that you make a contribution to processes associated with a developmental state.
The future is yours, how it will be depends on you positively participating now.
Roar young lions roar!!!!
I thank you.
Issued by: Office of the Premier, Eastern Cape Provincial Government
16 June 2010
Source: Eastern Cape Provincial Government (http://www.ecprov.gov.za/)
