Transcript of the speech by Deputy Minister of Transport, Jeremy Cronin, in the debate on the President's Budget Vote speech, National Assembly, Parliament, May 30 2012:
The DEPUTY MINISTER OF TRANSPORT: Hon Deputy Speaker, Mr President, Mr Deputy President, hon members and colleagues, one of the curiosities of the rules of Parliament, is that they describe the parliamentary leader of the second largest party in Parliament as the Leader of the Opposition. I wonder if the hon Buthelezi or the hon Holomisa or the hon Mulder brothers or the hon Themba Godi or the hon Mphahlele recognise the hon Lindiwe Mazibuko as their leader, or see themselves as part of the opposition, some singular oppositional bloc. [Interjections.]
It's for them to answer that question, but I want to ask the hon walking wounded and now departed Lekota something. He has squarely located himself as the underbelly, the libidinal voice of the DA, saying what many of the DA's own members actually think, but are too embarrassed to say out loud and in public. The hon Lekota's performance was frankly disgraceful.
The Brett Murray episode is perhaps not even fundamentally about constitutional rights. The right to the freedom of expression is very precious; the freedom of media. Some of us actually went to jail for fighting for the freedom of media. It's absolutely crucial, but so too is the right to human dignity, the right to dignity, not just for the President and the President's office, but for all South Africans. This episode is not fundamentally a legal matter; it is not fundamentally a constitutional matter, it is about our collective responsibilities that we all have as South Africans to our country and its people, our country that is not yet Jerusalema, and is not even Canada.
Rights are also about responsibilities. In a calm discussion that we had with the editor of City Press and, a calm discussion that the Minister of Arts and Culture has had with the director of Goodman Gallery, to their great credit, those two individuals recognised the importance of us all assuming responsibilities, upholding the rights of the Constitution, but understanding our location in South Africa. [Applause.]
I listened very carefully to what I thought were the wise words, for a change, of the Hon Mulder. I agree with him that we must not play the race card loosely and freely. I agree with him that we must not generalise about whites or blacks in South Africa. I am also encouraged to hear that according to his calculation, some 80% of Afrikaans speakers, in a phone-in programme on SABC, deplored the painting. But what the hon Mulder has left out was an important matter. I assume 80% of those that he calculated objected to the portrayal on moral and ecstatic grounds; they found the painting distasteful as the majority of us do.
We would however be making a grave mistake if we thought that for very many, many, many South Africans, black South African in particular, the feelings were only moral or just ecstatic. The portrayal provoked something much, much deeper. It caused great emotional hurt and it opened up unhealed wounds. This was so movingly illustrated and demonstrated when advocate Gcina Malindi, who is a hugely gentle and nonracial person, for any one who knows him, and who does not play the race card remotely, broke down in tears, in court. We all, especially us who happen to be white South Africans, need to hear, see and understand this profound reaction.
The DA, in the course of this week... [Interjections.]
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Deputy Minister, can you please take a seat for a while.
Mr J J MC GLUWA: Deputy Speaker, will the hon member take a very easy question? [Interjections.]
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Are you going to take a question, hon Deputy Minister?
The DEPUTY MINISTER OF TRANSPORT: No, I will not take a question.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: No, he will not. You can please sit down.
The DEPUTY MINISTER OF TRANSPORT: The DA, in the course of this week, understood tactically and perhaps if not emotionally, and recognised the complexities of this particular Brett Murray case, and chose to say very little indeed, wisely so, on this matter. But the hon Lekota budged in, bombastically treading on all of his hurts. I have been watching very carefully as you were speaking, hon Lekota. I watched the behaviour of the DA members in the House.
I do not generalise, but quite a few of the white DA members were hyper-excited by what you were saying. You were expressing what their prejudices were and, which they did not dare utter. [Interjections.] To your credit, the Leader of the Opposition was much more restrained; I am not playing it... [Interjections.]... I am making a point - I watched very carefully. But the hon Mazibuko and other black members and some white members, were more restrained. I think we need to understand that none of us must play loose and free with the issue.
On Sunday, the person that the rules of Parliament curiously describe as the Leader of the Opposition, the hon Lindiwe Mazibuko, had a very interesting article in the Sunday Times. It was a plea to all of us in Parliament, as the title said: To rise above our rivalries for the good of South Africa. Now, that is a very noble sentiment, whereas as you can see, a call on Sunday does not translate into a speech on Wednesday. [Interjections.]
The article correctly singled out the grave crisis of unemployment within or country, and particularly youth unemployment within our country and said that we should focus all of our attentions on this issue. The article was more silent on some of the other grave crises, which are linked to youth unemployment, like racialised unemployment, inequality and racialised property, but let us leave that to one side.
Now, let me read the article, and it goes to say, "rather than asking if an economic proposal conforms to the principles of Keynes or Mills or Hayek, I, that is the hon Mazibuko, would like to see an above partisan approach that works." Now, in pretending to being above ideology, notice how ideologically limited she is; her iconic reference points are Keynes, Mills, or Hayek. Is that all? How Eurocentric she is. Has nothing happened in the last 60 years in China or Brazil or in Africa, for that matter?
That was on Sunday, but today is Wednesday and the hon Mazibuko fails to follow her own advice. Today, on Wednesday, she tries to label the National Development Plan, Minister Manuel, as Hayekian, as near liberal, and tries to label the New Growth Path as Keynesian. She then asks the President whether government's policies are near liberal or welfarest. Confusion, confusion and confusion! [Interjections.]
I thought that the hon Koos van der Merwe was completely out of order when he interjected during the course of your speech. I agree with the hon Kalyan that his interjection had strong undertones if not overtones of sexism. I completely agree.
[Note: During Lindiwe Mazibuko's speech in the debate IFP MP Koos van der Merwe interjected "on a point of order" stating to laughter: "Before the member continues, could she just explain to the House what she has done to her hair."]
We all know that the hon Koos van der Merwe has little hair and he has a very little good sense, but at least we know that his hair is his own and his nonsense is his own. [Laughter.] But can we say the same for your contradictory ideas in your Sunday article on the one hand, and your Wednesday speech on the other? Are there different drafting teams in the DA? Is there factionalism in the DA or is it just ideological confusion? I think it is the latter. [Interjections.]
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Hon Deputy Minister, there is a point of order again. What is the point of order hon member?
Mr A WATSON: Hon Deputy Speaker, on a point of order: I maintain that the comments that the Deputy Minister has made about the Leader of the Opposition and the hair, are as... [Interjections.]... I am not talking to you... are as sexist as the remark by the hon Koos van der Merwe, and I would like you to rule on the issue.
The DEPUTY MINISTER OF TRANSPORT: I said nothing about the hon member's hair. All I said was that we know that the hon Koos van der Merwe's hair is his and that his nonsense is his. I further said that I was not sure about whether the ideas that were promoted on Sunday and Wednesday were hers or were of some drafting factional team who wrote them. [Interjections.] I might have spoken about a swollen hand without any sense of sexism whatsoever, but I did not do that either.
As the ANC, Deputy Speaker, and as the ANC-led government, we agree that as South Africans, we have to work together to address the challenges of our country, and indeed, of our global crisis-ridden epoch. [Interjections.] Working together doesn't mean that differences, including ideological differences disappear, or that we should suppress our debates, on the contrary, that is the very meat of democratic politics. As we debate, we should also do so with an overarching sense of responsibility to our country, our region, to the world in which we live, including our increasingly fragile natural world. [Interjections.]
I don not think that many of the contributions in today's debate, particularly those from the DA, have remotely appreciated the challenges and responsibilities that we all confront. Too often, the DA reduces working together to the idea of the government working together only with the corporate, private sector - life as a perennial market-driven public-private partnership, PPP. This government is committed to working with the corporate private sector, for no other reason than that there is a vast amount of wealth and resources, which often are not currently invested in productive activity that is to be found there. [Interjections.]
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order hon members, please!
The DEPUTY MINISTER OF TRANSPORT: The private corporate sector is not the only partner. Take the question of the Youth Wage Subsidy. This government is committed to a multipronged strategy to address unemployment, especially youth unemployment, including skills training, learnerships, assistance to small, medium and micro enterprises, SMMEs, co-operatives, the Expanded Public Works Programme, EPWP, including the Community Works Programme, CWP, and, yes, also various forms of subsidies. But how do you subsidise the unemployed youth? By subsidising the employers - is the DA's answer. That is how you subsidise the youth. [Interjections.]
And yes, that might be a way of doing it, but it takes a peculiarly class-biased set of blinkers not to recognise that there are many potential pitfalls and abuses down that route and, there are plenty of international examples - including currently in Spain, to demonstrate how abuses might proliferate when you subsidise the bosses to employ the youth at lower wages. We need to address the issue seriously. As we address the unemployment crisis, we need to work closely with all sectors of our society, including the organised labour and the unemployed in our communities. Any attempt to play off the one against the other, the organised labour against the unemployed, for narrow electoral purposes, is an exceedingly dangerous and irresponsible line of march.
One member talked about Nazism, throwing that term around loosely. I am not going to accuse any one here of Nazism because it would be wrong. [Interjections.] However, let us remember that precisely marches of the unemployed directed against the organised working class in Germany were the foundation of the development of the Nazi movement there. So, I am not accusing you of doing that, but do not play free and easy with something that is extremely dangerous. [Interjections.] [Applause.]
Certainly, one of the most innovative and dynamic approaches to working together, Mr President, is the Presidential Infrastructure Coordinating Commission, PICC, which you launched in October last year. Since the onset of the global economic crisis in 2008, we have understood that a major, state-led, multiyear infrastructure programme is our key, but not our only contra-cyclical strategy to sustain and dynamise, as best as possible, productive economic activity and job creation.
The PICC, as you have mentioned Mr President, has identified 17 strategic integrated projects. Catalytic infrastructure-build projects that would unlock untapped resources that will: Contribute towards job creation, both in the construction and in the postconstruction phase; help to develop neglected rural regions of our country; link actively with our industrial policy action programmes; address the economic dysfunctionality and social injustices associated with the apartheid spatial form of our urban spaces; prioritise energy efficient infrastructure, for instance, rail over road; help to drive effective links with our region and our continent; and, in short, will help to place our country onto a new growth path.
The PICC is an excellent example of working together, firstly, as government. The PICC as chaired by the President and deputised by the Deputy President, is constituted of a range of relevant national line department Ministers, all nine, not eight, all nine Premiers with a strong support from all nine Premiers - let me underline that. Metro mayors are active members of the PICC, including the Metro mayor of Cape Town and the SA Local Government Association, Salga. We are working together across clusters and line departments, as municipalities and provinces, and across different political parties, as one country and one government, under your leadership, Mr President.
The PICC met again in a plenary session yesterday. There was a leadership recognised by the Premier of the Western Cape very actively and supported in the course of this infrastructure issue; recognised by the Mayor of Cape Town, very actively and strongly, and supportive of the programmes of the PICC. Correctly so. [Interjectiosns].
The PICC met again in a plenary session, yesterday, Mr President. There was one key item on the agenda. It was to evaluate the actual construction activity that is underway. Too often, an impression is created that nothing is happening; that everything is just a talk-shop, a succession of one plan on paper after another.
South Africa is however starting to become, once more, the vast construction site of which you have spoken of, Mr President - unevenly, of course, and with many challenges, yes. In the progress report presented to yesterday's PICC plenary, we were reminded, just to take one example, that the Medupi Power Station, which is now 39,2% complete, not 39,1%, or 39,3%, we are monitoring this extremely closely as the PICC, and it employs currently 15 787 not, 15 786 workers on site.. [Applause.]
This is the largest construction site in the Southern Hemisphere, as we speak. Yes, there have been delays, and yes, the project started before the establishment of the PICC. The role of the PICC is to identify the reasons for the delays and to unblock problems. It is also, above all, to ensure that this massive, in this case, the electricity generation project is part of an integrated infrastructure, an economic and social developmental programme involving water, rail and mining infrastructure. Critically, it also has to ensure that the new city that is literally emerging in the veld at Lephalale, in the old Ellisras, is not just another apartheid-era mining town, but a green city, an integrated city, an economically functional and socially just city.
On Sunday, the hon Mazibuko piously called for us in Parliament to rise... [Interjections.] ... yes, I do, I am not blind, I am very genuine. On Sunday, the hon Mazibuko piously called on us all in Parliament to rise above our rivalries, remain united and focused, despite our differences, on the big issues of our country and of our world. Too often in the course of this debate, the hon Mazibuko and her colleagues continued to barrack and shout; they have been doing exactly the opposite; sinking this debate into petty rivalries and into tweetable quotes.
In supporting this Vote, Mr President, the ANC knows that you will not allow yourself or the rest of us to be destructed from the important tasks that are actively under construction in our country, as we speak. Thank you. [Applause.]
Source: Unrevised Transcript, Hansard, May 30 2012
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