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Honourable Ms Miet Simet - Chairperson of the delegation for relations with South African from the European Parliament.
Ms Dominique Dellicour - charge d' affairs
Honourable members of the European parliament
Distinguished guests
Ladies and Gentlemen

GOOD AFTERNOON

It is an honour and a privilege for me to be welcoming a delegation of parliamentarians from the European Union to our beautiful Province of the Eastern Cape and in particular, the city of Port Elizabeth, my home town. In this province we boast a beautiful coastline and a number of game reserves. In your busy schedule please do find time and enjoy what the Province has to offer. I promise, it will not be a waste of time.

We are generally known to be a poor Province, when compared to other Provinces in the country such as Gauteng and the Western Cape, and yes, there is some truth in that, especially in terms of infrastructural development. What we inherited on the day of the dawn of democracy was a huge backlog particularly in infrastructural development.

I was appointed MEC for Safety and Security in November 1995. A few weeks after my appointment I undertook a tour of the Province to acquaint myself with the people and the environment I was supposed to operate in. That tour exposed me to glaring imbalances that exist within the Province. In the former homeland part of the Province, the backlog was so huge that I had to seek outside assistance for any possible impact to be achieved.

I am relating this because I want to show our gratitude and say thank you to the European Union for having responded to our desperate calls for help. Today members of the Police Service operate in decent buildings. A special car has been designed for the police to operate in our rural areas. The police have computers and are confident in their work because of the training they received from resources granted by the European Union. I can describe their morale as high. All this is because of your assistance.

After 1999 elections, I was appointed to head both Safety Liaison and Transport. My contact with Traffic Officers in the Department of Transport exposed me to their needs. I raised those needs with the representative of DFID. We now together are looking at how we can address those needs.

You have been part of the foundation of our democratic building blocks in fields like Health, Economic development, Safety and Security and Local government so as to ensure that we, as a nation are capacitated and ready to govern and be amongst the leaders in the global world.

When reflecting on your programme during your visit to South Africa and the people you are meeting and interacting with like Senior Cabinet Ministers of the National Government this is clearly a true indication of your commitment, not just to the Eastern Cape but the South African government and nation.

Your involvement in improving of police infrastructure is not only reflected here this afternoon at this beautiful police station, but in the many more needy parts of the Eastern Cape where you assisted to renovating and building of new police stations.

However your involvement and assistance went beyond just infrastructure development, but also included vehicle fleet management, effective civilian oversight, community policing and a comprehensive human resource development programme aimed at training more than 4000 police members.

In the process of helping us in putting up an infrastructure you have also assisted in creating jobs desperately needed for the people of this Province. In so doing, you delivered a plate of food on the table for a number of families. We indeed thank you for that.

In an emerging democracy like ours, we need partners like the European Union. The challenge still facing us is huge. I want to appeal for your continued support. Together, we can build a better life for all within a caring society.

In conclusion allow me to make just one appeal to your Ms Miet Smet. The Debe Nek community in the Eastern Cape is to be deprived of a police station that is able to serve its entire people effectively. Your building project in the Eastern Cape has gone a long way to assisting us in building a new police station at Debe Nek.

I thank you

Issued by Safety, Liaison and Transport, Eastern Cape

23 March 2001