Programme Director, Mr Moses Tembe
Deputy President Motlanthe
Premier Zweli Mkhize
Chair of the African Renaissance, Minister S'bu Ndebele
Minister Gugile Nkwinti
Members of the Executive Council
Mayor of eThekwini, Cllr James Nxumalo
Councillors
Distinguished guests
Ladies and gentlemen.
I want to thank the conference organisers for the invitation to this important conference. It is quite befitting that this conference should be convened at such an important time for all of us as Africans. In two days' time, we will be celebrating 50 years of the founding of the Organisation of African Unity - the forerunner to the African Union. We will be celebrating half a century of the coming together of African leaders to form an organisation to fight for the freedom of all Africans.
This is an organisation whose aim was to promote unity, solidarity and cooperation among African people; eradicate colonialism; raise standards of living of all Africans and ensure that they enjoyed human rights. Fifty years on, we can look back with pride at what we have achieved collectively as Africans. We decided then that we would take charge of our political destiny and write a new story. Fifty years later, the story is a compelling one.
The continent has gained independence from its previous colonial masters; democratically elected governments govern many more countries than at any other point previously; and the continent is among the fastest growing regions. These are things which bode well for the yet to be achieved objectives of raising the standard of living of all Africans. Though still one of the poorest regions, this continent is drawing a great deal of attention from different corners of the globe not as a place plagued by civil wars - though pockets of civil wars still exist - but as a place of many opportunities.
Ben Okri offers some pertinent insights about history.
History is like a nightmare we wake up from after a struggle and blink in stupefaction at the strangeness of daylight. With awakening a great energy is freed; a new question is posed: the nightmare is over but what do we do with the day? We do not have enough psychologists of history. Everyone seems to treat history as if our reaction to it should be logical. The people have emerged from a mutual nightmare, what should they do upon awakening? What should anyone do after a long trauma? What can anyone do?
The unfortunate thing about history is that it gives us no rest, no holidays. There are no pauses; we go from struggle to struggle. The struggle to overcome and then the struggle to live, to grow, to realise the potential seeded in our bones. We go from tearing down the unacceptable to building the desirable without much of a break in the dance.
What is 'the desirable' that Okri speaks about? Each society has to figure out what is 'the desirable' it needs to build. In a country like ours, characterised by such levels of inequality it is difficult to define 'the desirable'. The view of what is desirable for a shack dweller is different to that held by a property owner - just as the view of what is desirable for a tenant farmworker is different from the farm owner. The view of what is desirable from the perspective of an employed person is different from that of a person who has never held a job. All of this makes governing in an unequal society very difficult and agreeing on a common objective almost impossible. But we cannot relent from that very responsibility.
Our Constitution articulates what 'the desirable' should be: It is a society in which all citizens can achieve a decent standard of living. In the National Development Plan, we define a decent standard of living by taking a comprehensive view that includes issues such as adequate housing, water, sanitation, electricity, safe and affordable public transport, quality education, health, safety and security, employment, good nutrition and a clean environment. Building this desirable temporal end state - however defined - was the basic belief of all who fought in the struggle for liberation. To build the desirable, we must draw on the same courage that saw this continent through its many struggles so that we make the right decisions without any fear of being unpopular.
As a continent, we need to pause and reflect on our history of the past 50 years and begin to develop lessons for the next 50 years. We need to ask what we learnt from the various strategies we used to regain our independence. What progress have we made? What are our successes and where have we failed? For me one of the key lessons is that we must take responsibility. We cannot allow our agenda to be set by anyone else but ourselves. We cannot expect things to be done for us. If we want to advance, we need to catalyse the change we want to see through better planning and more effective implementation. We need to use the resources at our disposal to drive the agenda of raising the standards of living of our people.
The second lesson is that we should guard against being waylaid by all manner of agendas that appear, on the face of it, to be pursuing the common objectives we all share. Often pursuing these self-serving agendas means that valuable time and energy were redirected away from 'building the desirable'. These debates, without any consequent action, detract from what should, in essence, be our focus. What we need is regional integration that draws on the respective strengths of the different countries that make up our continent to overcome our shortcomings. We need to draw on each other's' strength to build 'the desirable' for all our countries - not for one country to develop on the back of the suffering of another.
To progress as a continent and take advantage of the favourable position we find ourselves in, we must move from the premise that we can only benefit from each other's strength. This is very similar to running a race where the pace is set by the stronger runners. In 10 days' time, this province will stage the 88th Comrades Marathon. On the 2nd of June, 19000 men and women from various parts of the world will line up, a kilometre from where we are, to start the gruelling 90km race, dubbed the Ultimate Human Race. It would be an omission on my part not to pay tribute to these athletes who have spent many hours training and making many sacrifices for this event. There are many others who dream of conquering this ultimate test of human endurance one day, however without putting in the effort, their dreams will remain just that.
The Comrades Marathon is not easy and this year is an up run; by the time the athletes reach Polly Shorts they will wonder "will the pain ever end?”? They will need mental strength to carry them to the end. So I have to ask, do we as a continent have the mental strength to stay the course? We need to stay the course not merely for the joy of reaching our milestones but to achieve the broader objectives that induced us to be involved in the struggle in the first place.
It will not be easy. The levels of growth needed to make the decent standard of living possible have been achieved by a few countries only. The Growth Diagnostics report of the Growth Commission found that there are only 13 countries that experienced sustained high growth - this is defined as 7% per year or more for 25 years or longer, in the period after World War II.
Careful planning, a ruthless focus on implementation, political stamina and endurance over a long period is what we will need to achieve our goals. Like the athletes training for the Comrades Marathon, the task ahead require of us - all of us - to make sacrifices. As a country, South Africa has taken a step towards achieving this mammoth task by adopting the National Development Plan. But this is not the first time we are running the race nor is it only for a short period. For us the race is ongoing, very much like the way that Okri speaks about history - 'there are no pauses, we go from struggle to struggle'.
As a country, we have had to go from 'tearing down the unacceptable' in the early years of our democracy to 'building the desirable' now and we must do it 'without much of a break'. This is how we must understand the NDP. It is not a deviation from where we were headed but rather a refinement of the route. It builds on the values of the Constitution and the legislative framework that it gives rise to. In taking this approach, the National Planning Commission places great emphasis on implementation. Very simply put, the legislative and policy frameworks that have been adopted since the first democratic elections in 1994 are more than adequate, but requires proper implementation to be effective. We will never know what the boundary conditions are until we push up the barriers.
Using the Constitution as basis, the NDP proposes a long-term vision and plan for South Africa. In his State of the Nation Address on 14 February 2013, President Zuma described the NDP as our roadmap for the next 20 years. In this sense, it should guide the actions of every citizen, private enterprises, academic institutions, government departments, civil society and faith-based organisations on our path to achieving a decent standard of living for all our citizens.
Let me now turn to the broad goals of the National Development Plan. Consistent with the aims of the Organisation of African Unity to raise the standard of living of Africans and guided by our Constitution the Plan proposes that by 2030, South Africa should be a more prosperous and equal society. To achieve this, South Africa's economy needs to grow by 5.4% per year over the next 17 years. This is necessary to generate the resources we need to raise the standards of living.
We recognise that one of the most effective ways of distributing income, reducing inequality and fighting poverty is through employment. Employment allows us to harness the creativity and energy of our people so that they are able to contribute to the development of our nation. Beyond the material benefits, we cannot disregard the importance of the sense of dignity, purpose and personal well-being that being employed provides. It is, therefore, imperative that we remove all obstacles to employment.
The plan sets a target to create about 11 million new jobs. This sets a target that will lead to the unemployment rate falling from 27% in 2011 to 14% by 2020 with a further reduction to 6% by 2030. It is expected that total employment will rise from 13 million to 24 million. In the initial stages, many of these jobs will not fit the particular definition of decent work that many subscribe to. This is largely due to the inherited structure of our economy. To address this, South Africa needs a dual strategy of raising the skills profile of the population while at the same time creating new jobs.
The reality that we face is that the vast majority of our unemployed people have limited marketable skills. To create the millions of jobs we require, we have to expand those sectors that can absorb low-skilled workers. These sectors include mining, agriculture, manufacturing and services. This is a plan that takes the situation as it currently obtains and proposes reforms that are well within our reach rather than setting out an agenda for reforms that we would like but which may not be immediately achievable.
Improving our skills base will require a concerted effort and must start with correcting the basics. One of the difficulties we have to address in our development is the slow pace of improvement in the quality of education that our young people receive. We must raise the bar for all concerned to ensure that the education that all our children, regardless of where the school is located or whether it was a former Model C school, provides the highest quality possible. This will not be easy but necessary. It cannot be right that our education system perpetuates the inequalities that we inherited from our past and that children are automatically disadvantaged by virtue of their circumstances of their birth. Our Constitution demands of us to free the potential of each person.
The Plan emphasises the importance of quality education for all for achieving our goals as a country and borrows the concept of capabilities as central to the development process from the work of scholars such as Amartya Sen and others. Developing the human capabilities of our people is central to the NDP.
It goes beyond, simply improving the education of our young people who are at school. We need to improve the living conditions of all our citizens. It should start before birth, with pregnant mothers receiving the necessary nutrition and healthcare to ensure that we reduce mother and infant mortality and promote the birth of healthy children. Improving the nutrition of young children has been proven to improve their abilities once they start school. The Plan proposes that dedicated resources be channelled towards ensuring that children are well cared for from an early age and receive appropriate emotional, cognitive and physical development stimulation to improve the quality of education and long-term prospects of future generations.
It is important that we realise that investing in our future generations starts right from birth. While adequate health provision may require some investment and in this regard, the Plan endorses the implementation of the National Health Insurance, to a large extent, it is about ensuring that our health facilities are properly managed and that we get the basics right. We must have the same resolve as the Comrades Marathon runners in our approach - we must maintain our resolve in terms of mind and effort.
Improving the living conditions of our people requires us to have a comprehensive understanding of the realities that they face. A large number of our people live in informal settlements far from places of work and depend on inadequate, often unsafe public transport. In addition to the low cost-benefit ratio due to high transport costs, getting to and from work often poses dangers when it means travelling during the dark. This includes the cost to maintaining a stable family life when a parent or parents are largely absent. The Plan makes several proposals with regard to providing adequate infrastructure in the form of a comprehensive spatial development framework by improving the balance between location of jobs and people and improving public transport infrastructure and systems.
We also have many people who continue to live in the rural areas in situations where the migrant labour system continues to be a factor or where the population is dependent on social grants. The plan proposes measures to increase economic participation in rural areas through reforming land tenure, providing agricultural support services for farmers, expanding social services, ensuring higher agricultural output, mining, social investment and tourism.
The reality is that many of those living either in informal settlements or in rural areas who are reliant on the social safety net are especially dependent on government for the delivery of services delivery. While many of these challenges outlined can be traced back to the legacy of the apartheid system and will be so for some time, the provision of services to address these challenges today is not. The Plan makes a series of proposals to ensure that we have a capable and developmental state including, the creation of an administrative head of the public service and a hybrid approach to top appointments that allows for the reconciliation of administrative and political priorities; ensuring that only competent and suitably experienced people are appointed to senior positions; establishing a formal graduate recruitment scheme for the public service with provision for mentoring, training and reflection.
I want to reiterate the statement that the current legislative and policy framework is more than adequate to address the legacies of our past. The legislation governing municipal service delivery provides detailed mechanisms for engaging and involving communities in decision-making and planning. It is in the implementation, or lack thereof, that the problem arises, especially for the poor that are particularly dependent on these services. In leafy suburbs, the wealthier members of society are able to pay for private schooling and daycare, for private security; they are not dependent on public transport.
When the infrastructure begins to show signs of crumbling, they have the resources to contact their local council office and ensure that it is speedily addressed. It is more likely that regular feedback meetings will take place with councillors in these areas than in poorer areas. Yet, it is the same legislative framework that governs all of our country. This unevenness of implementation is an issue that cannot be addressed by resources only. Surely, we should all be running at the same pace?
Ultimately, to raise the standard of living as envisaged by the South African Constitution adopted in 1996 and by the Organisation for African Unity 50 years ago, we must focus on the economy. We are acutely aware that it has not been possible for any country to lift its population out of poverty and raise standards of living unless it was able to grow its economy in an inclusive manner over a sustained period of time. For us growing the economy is not a goal or 'the desirable' in itself; it is only a means to an end; the end is raising the standards of living of our people.
The NDP proposals on the economy build on our governments existing programmes and plans. They include plans to raise exports while taking steps to prevent excessive overvaluation of the currency; improving skills development; incentivising the employment of young and low skilled work seekers. The plan also proposes using fiscal policy more effectively to raise savings and investment, measures to increase competition in regulated sectors and broadening price regulation in sectors that are natural monopolies. To promote economic growth, we need to reduce the costs of transport and logistics, address spatial divisions and reduce the cost of living for those who are out of work or in low paying jobs.
In closing, there are those who tell our people to reject the NDP. We respect their right to hold a different view; but we must warn against a tendency to oppose without providing solutions. The criticism may be couched in language that purports to represent our common interest but to the extent that they offer no workable solutions based on a thorough understanding of our economic challenges, we would call for caution.
Esther Duflo, Professor of Poverty Alleviation and Development Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, speaks of the three 'I's that impede development. These are ideology, ignorance and inertia. Ideology frequently manifests in that irritating tendency to know the answer before the question is even posed or having a single answer for all questions. This produces an intellectual laziness that starves any enquiry of being able to advance. The result is that practitioners merely attempt to transpose experiences from elsewhere without examining the difference in conditions.
Ignorance has two sides - on the one hand ordinary citizens are disempowered because they do not know what their entitlements are, and on the other, there are those public servants who feel that they do not actually need to equip or motivate themselves to tackle the issues of poverty head-on. Frequently, nobody bothers to check whether they apply themselves or not. The poor outcomes of education for the majority speak volumes about the prevalence of this kind of ignorance. Inertia flows automatically from a situation in which the accountability chain is broken. We must fix these three 'I's, and focus on one other 'I', namely 'implementation'.
The scale of the challenge requires us to mobilise and deploy all our resources. No less than a movement involving all of us will deliver the required results. It is therefore appropriate that we discuss our plan in the context of the African Renaissance.
I thank you.
