“A Case for Sport Towards the implementation of Vision 2030”
Chairperson;
Members and delegates of the National Council of Provinces;
The 2013 Comrade Marathon runners are in the gallery to grace this important gathering led by Claude Moshiywa the 2013 Comrades Marathon winner;
Also in the Gallery are the table tennis players from the University Sport South Africa (USSA) who will be traveling to Russia in July to participate in the World University Championships. Also in the gallery are all our representatives of the sports movement in our country;
Ladies and Gentlemen, I would like to dedicate this speech to one of our own, Benni McCarthy who is retiring from football this year. We wish well in his future endeavours. Your work in sport has inspired many young people in South Africa especially those from communities that have challenges of drug and substance abuse as well as gangsterism and crime.
Ladies and Gentlemen, on 27 April 2014 South Africa will mark 20 years into our nascent democracy and invaluable freedom. On this watershed and historic day in the national calendar of our country we will be celebrating our 20th birthday as a constitutional democracy wherein institutions protecting democracy are respected by the citizenry including the rule of law. During this year and in 2014 our country and people will be engaged in activities that are aimed at searching for purpose and meaning of democracy and freedom.
As government and members of society we are called upon to engage the youth of our country to talk about the benefits and the significance of democracy and meaning of freedom with its concomitant responsibility. These young people will be engaged to give an account of how democracy and freedom have changed their lives? This campaign that will keep South Africa talking will be targeting the 20 year olds who were born in 1994. The born frees will give account to the nation of how it is to be born in a democracy and free society? This campaign is anchored on the giant pillars of social cohesion and nation building. Given the significance of our two decades in the history of our struggle, we will create platforms for such reflections by utilizing our National Youth Games and National Youth Camps amongst others for the reflections and escalating the debates.
It is for this reason, among others, that the sport and recreation movement together with the Department of Arts and Culture will be hosting a “Tribute to Nelson Mandela” Sport Day on 17 August 2013. During this day all South Africans will be “united in their diversity” to celebrate the Mandela Magic and take stock on the road we traversed in sport and recreation as well as in arts and culture in our struggle and quest for reconciliation and national unity. In partnership with our sister Department of Arts and Culture we will on the 17 August 2013 be celebrating the enormous contribution of this human colossal by hosting One Nation, One Venue, One Ticket Music Festival and Sport Spectacular. Viva Nelson Mandela!!!
Honourable Members and the House will recall that in November 2011 Sport and Recreation South Africa (SRSA) and the sport movement in general adopted the first ever National Sport and Recreation Plan (NSRP) in the history of our country. At the heart of the National Sport and Recreation Plan (NSRP) is our Vision 2030. We have, indeed, committed ourselves that at least by 2030 the playing fields in sport and recreation should be leveled. The majority of our sports people should have equal access to sport and recreation facilities, our national and regional teams should be representative, our school sport programme should be optimally resourced and implemented, and the administration and management of sport and recreation should be enhanced to the extent that it achieves our goal of “optimal performance and functional excellence”.
Ladies and gentlemen we are pleased to report to this August House that the National Sport and Recreation Plan (NSRP) have been costed. We will present it to the Treasury and thereafter to Cabinet as a matter of urgency. Cabinet will have to budget an amount of approximately R10 billion towards the fulfillment of the objectives of the NSRP. We will in the next coming months submit a Cabinet Memorandum to canvass support for the budgeting and funding of the NSRP. We will do this promoting in the main the funding of the broader School Sport Programme while Cabinet is considering the Cost of the NSRP. In the same vein, we intend to engage the Ministry of Trade and Industry with the intention to amend the ‘National Lotteries Act’ with a view to open a window of opportunity for the sport and recreation sector to independently access Lotteries funding and resources for sport and recreation service delivery.
Coupled with the above is our longstanding intention to meet with the Ministry of Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs to consolidate all matters related to the Municipal Infrastructure Grant (MIG). We intend to host a ‘Joint MINMEC’ in order to discuss all the pertinent issues regarding this matter, including the national roll-out of Outdoor Gyms across the country. We further intend to pull together all the funding opportunities for MIG into a single-pot in the Department of Sport and Recreation in order for the Department to deliver sport and recreation infrastructure. We will meet with our counterparts in the Department of Arts and Culture to receive advice about their funding for ‘building libraries’ with the intention to leverage on their experience to present a case for ‘building sport and recreation infrastructure’.
We are indeed pleased to report to the House that since the approval of Government’s Programme of Action (POA) at the beginning of the term of the 4th democratic government and progressive Parliament, SRSA has successfully implemented most of its strategic goals. There is still more work to be done and we should not be complacent!
During the same period of this government and beyond, SRSA has delivered and continues to deliver on two major areas as mandated by Outcome 12(b), namely that of ‘increasing opportunities for participation in sport and recreation, and facilitating inter-governmental co-operation in mega international events hosted in our country’.
In the last instance, the people of South Africa and our Government deserve a pat on the back and a round of applause for successfully hosting the AFCON 2013 Championships here at home! We are looking forward to hosting the CHAN Championships in 2014; in order for us to succeed we rely on the support and involvement of the South African people. The conversations about the host cities for CHAN 2014 must now begin in earnest and we expect the municipalities and provinces to actively participate in this process and guide us.
We have noted the tentative indication given by our President, Mr Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma in Japan concerning our readiness to host the 2024 Olympic Games. We are in deed excited at the prospects of bringing the Olympics to Africa for the first time. We will engage all in the sports movement about this possibility and call upon the MECs to also have similar engagements within their provinces and municipalities.
We have in the past stated our intention to revive boxing and return it to its former glory. To give effect to this pronouncement I have appointed the Deputy Minister to head a Steering Committee that will convene a Boxing Indaba at the end of July 2013. It is expected of Parliament and provinces to play an active and pivotal role in the consultation processes towards the National Boxing Indaba. Local and provincial Izindaba will assist in ensuring that the broadest possible consensus is reached on a number of critical issues prior to the National Indaba. For us at the heart of the Indaba must be the interest of the athlete and sustainability of Boxing South Africa. The Deputy Minister, Mr Gert Oosthuizen is not hear today with us due to our international commitments,
Honourable Members, SRSA tabled its Strategic Plan for the Fiscal Years 2012 to 2016 to the National Assembly in March 2012. We also presented the Strategic Plan in March 2013 as well as our Annual Performance Plan (APP) for the 2013/14 financial year on 7 and 8 May 2013 in both Houses of Parliament.
These documents give the nation a clear picture of the planned programmes and activities of SRSA for the next five years as well as budget allocations and estimates for such years. The annual performance plan provides the activities and targets that are aimed at realizing the stated objectives of our plans in the current year. Our plans ARE FULLY ALIGNED TO THE National Sport and Recreation Plan and the National Development Plan.
Ladies and Gentlemen, SRSA budget allocation for 2013/2014 Financial Year amounts to R1.073 billion. Seventy-three percent (73%) of this amount, which is R815 million, is transferred to provinces, municipalities and sports federations. A bulk of it goes to Provincial Conditional Grants and the School Sport Programme and only R258 million will be utilized by the National Department for all its activities including salaries. This confirms our submission that this year’s allocation for the Department remains very minimal in real terms.
Honourable Members, we would like to take this opportunity to register our concerns about the utilization of the Conditional Grant by provinces, which is funded through the Division of Revenue Act from the fiscus. The management of the mass participation and sport development conditional grant requires particular attention. Compliance from the provinces has generally been poor and the funding model applied has now been refined to address key areas of delivery aligned to our objectives. The monitoring of the grant needs to be improved and the general management of the grant tightened. An internal task team has been established to address these issues. We have agreed at MINMEC to tighten scale up, expedite and deliver according to our promises, especially at provincial level.
In order to fulfill the obligations of the NSRP and the Annual Performance Plan (APP) for 2013/14, SRSA together with the Department of Basic Education is continuing to implement the school sport programme in 2013. This programme rolls out the School Sport Leagues across the country. It will again culminate in the National School Sport Championships in December 2013.
Ladies and Gentlemen, as we have adopted Vision 2030 in November 2011, we stand before you this afternoon to present our 2013/2014 Budget Policy Statement. We present this Budget Policy Statement to this House today imbued with the spirit of exuberance and excitement due to the remarkable progress we have made since the adoption of the National Sport and Recreation Plan (NSRP) in 2011. This exuberance and excitement we display today is propelled by the strides we have made during the years 2011/2012 and 2012/2013 which influence our programme of action for 2013/2014 financial period.
It is against this background that our country will see SRSA setting the agenda for sport and recreation in South Africa. It is generally acknowledged that we can do better with limited resources at our disposal; and to this end SRSA is engaging all sport bodies including SASCOC to review the delivery of sport programmes that are aimed at achieving excellence at development and high performance levels.
Chairperson, as we announced last year in this House our appointment of the Eminent Persons Group on Transformation (EPG), one of the key components of the NSRP is a Transformation Charter and its Scorecard. The baseline of transformation in South African sport needs to be determined and the EPG’s work has started in earnest with the cooperation of SASCOC and all National Federations and Sport Bodies. Because of the importance of transformation for the future of South African sport, it is imperative that SRSA delivers on this focus area. Internal capacity will be provided for the work of the EPG to assist national federations to implement the Charter and to accurately complete the scorecard. The national federations will be subjected to a transformation review to monitor progress in this regard. Starting from this year we will announce a transformation barometer on all Federations’ progress or lack of it in the transformation score-card. We will publicly name, blame and shame all those non-compliant Federations and sport bodies. This will include dealing viciously and decisively with corruption and maladministration in sport and recreation. We will withhold funding, moral and political support from all federations and individuals who have exaggerated egos and false sense of importance. We are saying to federations and sports administrators get off your high horses. We want change, we want transformation now. South African deserves the better.
We will give incentives to all compliant Federations and sport bodies. We are providing secretarial support to the EPG to fast-track its work to produce quarterly consolidated National Federation Transformation Progress Reports based on their interactions with SASCOC, the national federations and play a coordinating role regarding transformation within other SRSA programmes. These efforts will be supported by the work of the Ministerial Advisory Committee on Recreation, which is leading our transformation agenda in the recreation sector of our society.
This will include, amongst others, the resuscitation and development of rural sport. This programme will support a rural sport improvement programme in partnership and with the guidance of the National House of Traditional Leaders. The programme will involve ministerial outreach to rural areas to distribute sports equipment and roll-out Outdoor Gyms and other sport and recreation materials and facilities to many rural communities across the country, beginning by one Outdoor Gym per Province in 2013/14. Over the medium term, the department will develop a single governance framework for recreation to strengthen the delivery of recreation programmes. It is envisaged that these programmes will not be institutionalized, but will be community initiatives driven by educational and public promotional campaigns.
Our Ministerial School Sport Bursary scheme which donates an amount of a hundred thousand rands (R100 000) towards the education of each identified learner who excels in sport but is also academically deserving, is a life-line to many poor families who cannot afford to enrol their children in quality schools in our country.
Ladies and Gentlemen, the progress we have made in the four and half years bears testimony to the all-round work we have collectively undertaken with the MECs and our officials. Our flagship School Sport Programme together with our National School Championships 2012, gives us the motivation and assurance that we are on the right track. We are showing this through the ‘force of commitment’ to change the face of sport and recreation in South Africa. Honourable Members, it is this courage and bravery that keeps some of us going. It is such commitment to the good of our people that gives purpose to our lives. It is the commitment to work and the spirit of robustness that we are beginning to see change in the face of sport in South Africa today. We even slowly are changing the face of sport in schools since we came into sport and recreation. Schools are not the same again in the history of the Republic of South Africa. Today in South Africa schools are becoming centres of learning and play. Schools today in our country are becoming institutions of education, innovation and recreation. What we need to do going forward is to make physical education a stand alone learning area in all public schools of the Republic.
In conclusion Chairperson, as we complete the journey that began in 1912 by the Great Generation who travelled on the horse-back from Limpopo and other parts of Africa to grace the occasion of the birth of the ANC, the oldest liberation movement in the continent, we must soldier-on as this current Re-Generation for the next 100 years to fulfil the wishes of our Great-Great Generation of Chief Commander Oliver Reginald Tambo and Chief Albert Luthuli when it concluded that:
“The fight for (total) freedom (and independence) must go on until it is won; until our country is free, happy and peaceful as part of the community of man. We cannot rest.”
Lastly, I would like to convey my sincere gratitude to the Deputy Minister, the Director-General and all the officials of the Department of Sport and Recreation. My special gratitude goes to all the MECs and all committees of sport in all our Legislatures for their dedication and commitment to the work of sport in this country. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank the African National Congress for affording us this opportunity to prove ourselves and to prove to others what we are made off and what the ANC made us to be?
Thank you.
