Programme Director and MEC Mr Jacob Mamabolo;
Minister for Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta), Pravin Gordhan;
Ekurhuleni Executive Mayor, Clr Mondli Gungubele;
SALGA Chairperson in Gauteng, Clr Parks Tau;
Members of the Gauteng Executive Council present;
Members of Mayoral Committees and Ward Councillors;
Senior public service managers from COGTA;
Distinguished delegates;
Fellow compatriots;
Programme Director.
We gather here as servants of the people at the beginning of the Heritage Month, which has also been declared a Public Service Month in order to underscore the profound importance of speeding up service delivery as the hallmark of the 5th administration led by Honourable President Jacob Zuma.
We are indeed united by the common cause to serve the people of our country with honour, dignity and distinction in our collective quest to make a full transition from apartheid to a national democratic society.
I would like to welcome all of you to this Conference.
A special word of welcome is extended to Minister Pravin Gordhan and we thank him for agreeing to come and address this truly ground-breaking conference on popular democracy and community participation in the governance and development process.
We have just concluded the Women’s Month and I would like to say to all women councillors and women public servants, “Malibongwe igama la makhosikazi”. I am confident that the unique challenges facing women in public office will receive full attention of this Conference over the next two days.
Programme Director
It is important to understand that we meet in an era that must be characterised by a series of decisive radical shifts in the way we govern and in the outcome and impact of our government programmes. The call for a new era was captured aptly by President Jacob Zuma during his inauguration on 24 May 2014, and I quote: “Today marks the beginning of the second phase of our transition from apartheid to a national democratic society. This second phase will involve the implementation of radical socio-economic transformation policies and programmes over the next five years.”
We have already placed before the nation, the National Development Plan (NDP), our road map which outlines the type of society we envisage by the year 2030. Through this programme, we will move South Africa forward to prosperity and success.
Distinguished Delegates, we have just reached first hundred days in office. So what have we been doing since we took oath of Office on 21 May this year?
We have working tirelessly to elaborate a strategic posture and unpack a series of programmatic interventions that responds comprehensibly to the call for a radical shift in line with the NDP and the Manifesto of the governing party.
In Gauteng, we have adopted a medium term pillar programme on the Four Transformations, Four Modernisations and Two Industrialisations (TMR Thesis), which is about:
- Radical transformation of the economy, spatial landscape, society and the state;
- Modernisation of the economy, the public service, human settlements and urban development and infrastructure; and
- Re-industrialisation of Gauteng in order to take a lead in Africa’s new industrial revolution.
We have taken steps to strengthen coordination and integration in line with the long held vision of building Gauteng into a seamlessly integrated, socially cohesive, economically and environmentally sustainable City Region, underpinned by smart, green and innovation driven industrial base and balanced intra-regional development.
The need to strengthen Gauteng City Region (GCR) institutions and Gauteng wide planning and implementation is critical for the provincial and local government. In Gauteng we have all come to the conclusion that it is only when we plan and act together that we can strengthen our position as the leading economic hub of our country that is fuelling and driving Africa’s new industrial revolution. The GCR is our collective brainchild and common destiny.
Programme Director, we cannot effect radical social and economic transformation if we do not change the way government works and the way the state relates to society. I strongly believe this is something that must be changed first.
The need to review mechanisms and structures of community involvement and public participation and take decisive steps to strengthen local democracy is one of the critical elements of radical socio-economic transformation, the distinguishing feature and critical differentiator of the 5th administration.
Part of the necessary radical shift we must make is to reassert certain principles and values that have guided us during the struggle against racial oppression and apartheid tyranny:
- The first principle is that public representatives and civil servants are here to serve the people, not the other way round. We must be responsive and accountable to the people.
- The second principle is that the people must be actively involved in finding solutions to their own problems and shaping their own destiny – the principle of people-centred and people-driven development.
- Third principle is that radical social and economic transformation requires activism and social mobilisation. An activist government and active citizenry are not luxuries but necessary ingredients of the radical shift we must make.
- The fourth principle is that self-interest and the pursuit for private gain must be eliminated from the public and political institutions to protect the integrity public institutions and their decision- making processes.
- Lastly, we must build a track record that we can deliver on all commitments we make – our capacity to deliver on the basic services and core policy priorities must be beyond reproach.
I would like to draw from the 2013 Quality of Life Survey III released by our venerable Gauteng City Region Observatory (GCRO) to illustrate how we are doing on the principles outlined in the above.
With regard to the level of satisfaction with the delivery of basic services and infrastructure (houses, electricity, roads, water, sanitation and refuse collection), it is clear that Gauteng is a province of paradoxes wherein happiness and unhappiness, satisfaction and dissatisfaction exist side-by-side.
Our people are happy and unhappy, satisfied and unsatisfied. Very happy and satisfied with the quality of services they receive; very unhappy and dissatisfied with the people providing these services and the way in which government works.
Gauteng people are generally happy with the level of delivery but their level of trust in public officials is declining sharply. This erosion of public confidence correlates with the fact that corruption is now seen as the main threat to our democracy. The loss of confidence in the public participation process like the IDP process coincides with the sustained increase in community protests.
It is therefore clear that building an activist government, promoting clean government and integrity of public officials as well as building popular democracy are central to winning back public trust and confidence. We cannot do otherwise.
We must undertake extra-ordinary interventions to restore the integrity of public institutions and public servants that they are not vulnerable or corruptible by those in the private sector or those with political connections.
We must fundamentally review the structures and processes of public participation to reassert the principle that the people are their own liberators rather than passive recipients of services delivered.
And we must promote and cultivate the perspective of the activist government that is responsive, transparent and results-driven.
The GCRO survey has shaped our approach to governance and service delivery over the next five years. We are on the ground engaging actively with communities on matters of concern as an activist government. We are visiting frontline service delivery sites to promote Batho Pele principles and ensure that public servants treat our people with dignity.
We are also taking steps to strengthen the integrity of public institutions by opening the tender processes and enhancing measures to prevent fraud and corruption in the allocation of tenders.
Over the past hundred days, we have already been doing a number of things to address public dissatisfaction with government and public participation process.
We have been visiting hospitals, police stations, schools, increasing centres and other government frontline services delivery sites to shake up the public service and instil Batho Pele principle and promote integrity, honesty and professional service. MECs, Mayors, MMCs are beginning to respond promptly and swiftly to issues in communities.
Together with Mayors, the MEC for Human Settlements has been constituently, promptly and swiftly engaging communities that face challenges and problems. He has engaged with more than 10 communities and hotspots and this has stabilised the province.
Together with the MMCs, the MEC for Community Safety and Social Development there has been intervention visibly in high profile acts of criminality perpetrated against children caught in cross-fire during car hijacking and gang violence.
MEC for Economic Development has been engaging with 65 communities on the revitalisation of the township, meeting over 50 000 township entrepreneurs in one month.
From where I sit, we have been actively engaging other sectors of society - religious leaders, women’s organisations, business leaders - on various elements of our 10-pillar programme to transform, modernise and re-industrialise Gauteng.
Once again the message we are getting is that we are listening, we are engaging, we care and we act on all public concerns, including e-tolls. We cannot do otherwise.
We are a government of the people, for the people and with the people. We are neither arrogant nor populist. We are just principled and consistent with and for the people.
Programme Director, this conference is also a platform to address tow imperatives that derive from the State of the Province Address. I made a commitment that we revive the ward committees and IDP process to address community concerns. I also made a commitment that we will set up the service delivery war room in order to ensure there is central coordinated, highly integrated rapid response machinery that will enhance responsive to service delivery complaints.
Firstly, it is our expectation that this conference will do a detailed review of why the people have lost confidence in the current structures and processes of public participation and what needs to be done to build popular democracy and people’s power in action. How do we re- energise our communities and ensure they actively participate in community development in a constructive and proactive way?
Secondly, it is also my expectation that the conference will discuss the Service Delivery War Room machinery from ward to provincial level in order to improve the responsiveness and galvanize all resources of provincial and local government in a coordinated and integrated way as part of an active government approach.
We have thousands of community development workers, community health workers, safety patrollers and a range of community based workers located at different departments and spheres of government. We must properly mobilise and organise our community development activists.
My third and last expectation is that this Conference should also discuss how can we empower ward councillors and place them at the centre of building local popular democracy and people’s power on the one hand enhancing capacity for rapid response to unblock service delivery and resolve community complaints on the other hand.
Ward councillors in particular and councillors in general face many challenges. As public representatives who stand at the coalface of service delivery, they carry the heaviest burden and pressure and are often unfairly blamed for all government failures of executives in all three spheres of government.
Part of our discussion must focus on repositioning ward councillors as the representatives of the community to government like MPs and MPLs, not the other way round.
Ward councillors must save themselves by not getting involved in administrative issues such as housing allocations, recruitment of local labour and local contractors.
Finally we must ensure the safety of councillors and their families.
Together let us move the Gauteng City Region Forward! Together let us move South Africa Forward!
I thank you!
