Speech by Minister Trevor Manuel (MP) during the National Assembly Debate on SONA, February 14 2012

Honourable Speaker

Happy Valentine's Day to all of you. I bring flowers and chocolates to help spice up this debate, figuratively speaking. The President last week framed his speech with reference to the draft National Development Plan that the National Planning Commission released on 11 November 2012.

To better understand the context in which the NDP fits into the State of the Nation Address I am going to share a few more details of the plan today.

The NDP sets out a vision of the kind of country we want to build by 2030. The vision statement contained in the plan envisages that:

"... in 2030 we live in a country which we have remade. We have created a home where everybody feels free yet bounded to others; where everyone embraces their full potential; a community that is proud to be a community that cares." (Quote from vision statement)

What we want by 2030 is to have created a country in which we value one another, in which we value life and we value our communities. We value doing the right thing. We want to have created a home where everybody feels free yet bounded to others. This plan is about what binds us.

What binds us is a new story, a story for a better South Africa and for all its people, a story to eliminate poverty and reduce inequality, a story that changes the life chances of our people, particularly young people and women; a story that draws on our history, our experience and our traditions.

And so Honourable Speaker, the plan sets out the high level objectives of where we want to get to by 2030 as well as how the Commission believes we can remake our country in the vision of our Constitution between now and that date. The plan also provides a great deal of detail on, for example, where we think a railway should be built, how to finance it and how to ensure that it functions optimally. We believe these are critical endpoints to improve the life chances of our people.

When the Commission was inaugurated in May 2010, the President gave the Commission the license to be bold, honest and critical. He explicitly stated that he did not want a back-slapping commission. His faith was tested when the Commission released a diagnostic document in June last year which presented a sharply honest and critical appraisal of our performance since 1994 and our failure to overcome poverty and inequality.

The draft plan that we unveiled in November is similarly bold and honest. If we don't strike out bravely, the cleavages in our society will simply deepen.

The two main objectives we arrived at in the plan are that we want to eliminate poverty and reduce inequality. Consistent with the diagnostic report and the views of thousands of people who were consulted, increasing employment and improving the quality of education form our highest priorities in the plan. In summary, the plan is as follows:

• A united country, where all citizens are active participants in their own development  
• A capable state that drives development, promotes ethics and serves the citizenry  
• A dynamic and growing economy that is more labour absorbing, providing opportunities for all, supported by adequate infrastructure  
• An education, skills and innovation system that can develop the capabilities of our people and our country; and  
• Leaders who work together to confront and overcome our problems  The five key themes run through the thirteen chapters in the plan.

The chapters of the plan cover

Economy and employment
Economic infrastructure
Transition to a low carbon economy
Rural economy
South Africa in the region and the world
Spatial settlement planning
Education, skills and innovation
Health
Social protection
Citizen safety
A capable state
Fighting corruption
Social Cohesion, Nation building and transformation

In crafting the plan we took also into account several factors, such as demographic and global trends that are profoundly changing our world.  Africa belongs to all who live in it and that all are equal before the law. How do we make the Constitution a reality for all South Africans? How do we ensure that opportunities for each person are not determined by who they are or where they were born but by their hard work, effort, skill, talents and the opportunities open to them?

In all our encounters with thousands of people across the country the message has been clear: South Africans love our country. They are proud of our achievements since 1994, have faith in our democratic institutions and want to see greater success for our country. They are prepared to commit themselves to building a better South Africa. Our challenge is to make it possible for them to contribute to the South Africa we want to see by 2030. This plan is not a sermon from the mount. It's about identifying how people can be empowered to enable change. We need to reshape expectations we have of government. We have to forge an active citizenry that takes ownership of the solutions to our problems.

The plan is about achieving this shift in perspectives and relationships. It also contains very specific recommendations. For example, in the chapter on an integrated and inclusive rural economy we focus on support systems that will give life to land redistribution. We need to put land to productive use. We estimate that agriculture has the potential to create close to 1 million new jobs if the plan is implemented immediately and effectively. To achieve this we need to:

• Expand irrigated agriculture by substantially investing in water resource and irrigation infrastructure
• Create security of tenure for communal farmers. This is vital if we are to secure incomes for existing farmers and for new entrants. We must investigate flexible systems of land use for different kinds of farming on communal lands
• Invest substantially in providing innovative market linkages for small-scale farmers in the communal and land reform areas, with provision to link these farmers to markets in South Africa and further afield in the sub-continent.
• Put in place preferential procurement mechanisms to ensure that new entrants into agriculture can access the "food away from home" market, including school feeding schemes and other forms of institutionalised catering such as food services in hospitals and correctional facilities.
• Give greater support to public-private partnerships to develop under-exploited opportunities. Examples of regions with untapped potential include the Makatini Flats and the Eastern Cape

Next year, 2013, marks the 100th anniversary of the Land Act. This Act reshaped the political geography of South Africa in dramatic ways. It transformed spatial settlement patterns in both rural and urban areas, effectively cutting of the vast majority of South Africans from places of economic opportunity.

The chapter on the rural economy makes detailed proposals on how land reform can be unblocked and implemented in a collaborative manner, with clear roles for district municipalities, communities and farmers.

The chapter on transforming urban and rural spaces spells out why and how we can unravel the spatial patterns of Apartheid that still plague us. Transforming human settlements is a large and complex agenda requiring far-reaching policy changes.

Most state investment goes into household services. Over time, the state should shift its role from a direct housing provider to a housing facilitator, developing public goods through investment in public transport, economic and social infrastructure and quality public spaces.

The plan addresses how we can transform where people live; how we can break the pattern of government building soulless little boxes and instead facilitate the development of communities. We want to link where people sleep, pray and play with where they work.

We want to develop communities understanding that the quality of life for many is undermined by the fact that they must travel great distances to get to and from work; Developing a more coherent and inclusive approach to land.

All municipalities should be encouraged to formulate specific land policies showing how vacant and under-used land will be developed and managed to achieve wider socio-economic objectives

Radically revising the housing finance regime by shifting funding away from building single houses to supporting the development of a wide variety of housing types with different tenure arrangements, including affordable rental and social housing.

Strengthening the link between public transport and land use management with the introduction of incentives and regulations to support compact mixed-use developments

Enhancing the existing national programme for informal settlements by developing a range of tailored responses to their upgrade including minimum health and safety standards.

We need strong and mature leadership both in government and from communities to achieve the unity and common purpose required to see the plan through. Leadership is about problem solving. We need initiative. We need voice. We need to test ideas. We can all be leaders in our society. We can all implement the solutions we have collectively identified.

This requires us to change the way we approach challenges. It requires a paradigm shift. This is what we propose in the plan. In coming up with solutions, the Commission has drawn strongly from definitions of development that focus on creating the conditions, opportunities and capabilities that enable people to lead the lives they desire. Development is the process of raising the capabilities of all citizens, particularly those who were previously disadvantaged.

The development of capabilities is critical to enable our youth to grasp the opportunities that we develop. Education and skills development are critical capabilities, but there are others too. Better public transport, a well designed social safety net, a healthy population, better located housing settlements and safer communities are critical to enable people to improve their own lives. The plan therefore charts a new course.

This new course is one where communities in partnership with government develop the capabilities to improve their own lives through education, employment, healthcare, transport, social security and safer communities. At the same time, we have to broaden the economic opportunities available to citizens.

This requires faster economic growth, a more labour absorbing economy, higher levels of investment, inclusive and integrated rural economies and better located human settlements. While we build these capabilities for both individuals and for the country, we must do so mindful of the impact on our environment, which is an endowment we cannot destroy.

The paradigm shift from a delivery model to a capabilities approach requires three complementary enablers

The first of this is an active citizenry, involved in their own development and in the development of their community.  The second is a capable and effective state, able to understand when and where it needs to act, what its limitations are and how to partner with other forces in society to achieve complex objectives.  The third enabler is strong and mature leadership from all institutions in society.

An active citizenry, working in partnership with government, business and civil society is critical to this new development paradigm. While the state can build schools, we need communities to work with the schools to ensure that they work properly and that children study hard. The change is to an environment where communities are active in their own development.

The challenge we face in our education sector illustrates this point well. There is universal acknowledgement that our education system fails the poor. Members may have seen the short animated story that the Commission produced about Thandi to illustrate the impact of circumstances on the life of a young school-leaver. Our plan is about improving the life chances of Thandi. This covers impreducation system to making sure that more school leavers get jobs.

Achieving this requires a collective effort. We have to talk to one another and draw on the energies of those who are committed to finding solutions. We must leave the naysayers behind.

We hope that the proposals in the plan will be taken in the spirit in which they were designed - an honest and open-handed attempt to tackle the deep-seated problems that bedevil our country.

The process of developing this plan has indeed been a unique one. It was a bold and brave step by the President to appoint a commission of people outside of government, South Africans who care deeply about their country, to help develop a national plan for the country. The President has shown remarkable confidence in our institutions of democracy to embark on such an open process.

The plan is the product of not just the commissioners but also tens of thousands of ordinary South Africans, young and old, black and white, who have shared with us their dreams, hopes and ideas for the future. Following the release of the Diagnostic Report, the Commission embarked on a broad public consultation, which took us from deep rural areas in Mpumalanga to East London in the Eastern Cape. In addition to dozens of direct, face-to-face discussions with communities and organisations, the Commission also hosted an online, interactive discussion with about 10 000 young people.

There are several important areas that the Commission did not get to. Some of these areas include new and more inclusive models of economic empowerment, ways to enhance national reconciliation and regional peace and security issues.

We are engaging with South Africans on the proposals in the plan. This is both a heartening and humbling experience. It is heartening because so many of our fellow citizens share our broad approach, support the values in our Constitution and agree with the key priorities which we have outlined. And it is humbling because we, the Commission, know so little about many of these issues. Our discussions have been hugely enriched by the considered and often detail views of ordinary South Africans on how to solve out most critical challenges.

We look forward to engaging with Parliament and for Parliament to facilitate further engagement on the proposed plan. In June or perhaps early July, we will take a refined document back to cabinet for adoption.

The work of the National Planning Commission does not end this year. After the plan is presented to Cabinet in a few months, the Commission will begin detailed work. We will take three or four areas each year, so that we can complete the detailed work within the three and half years left of the term of the Commission.

Allow me to leave you with another quote from the vision statement;

"South Africa belongs to all its peoples. Now, in 2030, our story keeps growing as if spring is always with us. Once, we uttered the dream of a rainbow. Now we see it, living it. It does not curve over the sky. It is refracted in each one of us at home, in the community, in the city, and across the land, in an abundance of colour. When we see it in the faces of our children, we know: there will always be, for us, a worthy future."

Issued by the ANC, February 14 2012

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