Response by Independent Democrats leader, Patricia de Lille MP, to Jacob Zuma's state of the nation address, June 4 2009

Mr President, we appreciate your invitation to civil society, business and non-governing political parties to come to the table.

En ek waardeur ook jou poging om Afrikaans te praat.

It is our hope that this is not just a symbolic invitation to us, because we in the Independent Democrats are ready to engage with you to find Solutions to the challenges we face.

The global recession means that we need a plan that all South Africans can rally around, a plan that can tap into our collective patriotism, skills and wisdom and bring us together as a nation.

Mr President, in your State of the Nation Address you shared the beginnings of such a plan.

Your list of goals and priorities are laudable, but we have heard some of them before and the key issue, as always, will be implementation.

The ID has always said that without implementation and monitoring the best plans will come to nothing, which is why we need to hear the details about how the National Planning Commission will work and the role it will play in getting the job done.

Mr President, the ID is pleased to hear that for the first time there is going to be monitoring and evaluation of the performance of Ministers.

We have repeatedly said that Ministers must be held accountable for their responsibilities and actions.

We hope that you will make these performance indicators public every 3 months so that we as a nation can be kept abreast of delivery achievements and failures.

It is our hope that you will become the first President to fire a Minister for incompetence or for failing to spend their budget.

This is the one time when Mshini Wam will be relevant and we in the Independent Democrats will be prepared to sing along with you.

Mr President, there are several issues which we think must be addressed.

You have called on our nation to cut our cloth according to its size, but you have made several promises and commitments which pose the question: where will we get the resources from?

We are also concerned about the large-scale mismanagement of our state-owned enterprises, at a time when we cannot afford it.

SAA, SABC, Denel and the PBMR have all cost taxpayers billions of rand, which we urgently need for health, education and rural development.

We are also concerned about the effect this recession will have on BEE as a whole.

Often in the past we have relied on economic growth to fund BEE deals and the current economic outlook means this funding has fallen away.

The ID would also like to see targets and timelines for BEE and Affirmative Action.

Leaving these processes open and without sufficient targets has produced a few wealthy individuals, while the vast majority of our people continue to be excluded.

Mr President, our public health system is in a state of disrepair and has been starved of financial and human resources.

While the ID applauds your goal of delivering ARVs to 80% of Aids patients in need by 2011, this cannot be achieved unless there are drastic improvements in the sector as a whole.

The ID supports the idea of a national health insurance and we urge Cabinet to devise a comprehensive plan for its implementation.

We recognize the complexities involved, but the first step must be an injection of funds into the health sector and massive improvements in the way it is managed.

We also urge you to intervene in the dispute with the doctors in the public sector, who we must all agree are underpaid and overworked.

We welcome the emphasis on rural development and we support your comments that teachers must be in classrooms teaching. However, this commitment will only be realized if you are able to get the support of teachers, children, parents and the unions.

The economic crisis we are facing will require innovative thinking.

It is our belief that we can turn this crisis into an opportunity and ID MP Lance Greyling will present the ID's Solutions in the House tomorrow.

Thank you.

Issued by the Independent Democrats, June 4 2009

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