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Mr Speaker,

This year's State of the Province Address takes place in the unusual institutional context of our Parliament having been dissolved to allow for the next elections to take place on 14 April. In spite of its dissolution, in terms of the Constitution, this Parliament remains competent to function. Accordingly, I am delivering my State of the Province Address, even though we have not had a formal opening of our Parliament, which will take place after the elections.

In presenting the State of the Province to this Honourable Parliament, I am proud to take cognisance that KwaZulu-Natal is a leader and its government is an example of excellence throughout South Africa. Our province has always been unique and its diverse and unified people have always had something uniquely special as compared to the rest of South Africa. Today, we can take pride in the fact that our uniqueness has proved our capacity not only to be different, but indeed to be better. We have accepted the challenge to lead by example.

We are proud to have proved that diversity is indeed a source of strength and progress for the entire country. Our example and leadership has not only benefited the people of our province, but indeed the whole of South Africa. I invite this Parliament to take pride in this, irrespective of political divisions, in the hope that we can find one another across the political spectrum in recognising that what we do here is our sole responsibility. We are not here to take orders from people in Pretoria or Cape Town, but we are here to do the best we can, not only to serve the people we represent, but also to set an example to the rest of South Africa. I really hope that on this fundamental point of departure our political differences and the rhetoric of the electoral campaign may fade away, and we may find one another in this House as colleagues who are equally committed in making our province a success and an example for the whole of South Africa. We can no longer tolerate anyone who is bent on the failure of our province and intends to frustrate its efforts to succeed and excel.

Today we are completing a cycle and creating the basis for a new one. When I took office in February 1999, people predicted that I would last three months. Today I am completing my first full term as the Premier of this province and look at this not as my personal success, but as the success of a province that has come together in the name of good governance and progress. I do not wish to attach to my premiership any personal importance but I know that it stands for something the importance of which goes beyond my humble person.

For the past eighteen months a great deal of South African politics has turned around a string of attempts aimed at ousting me out of my office, to the point that our Constitution had to be tampered with to try to reach such a nefarious end. My political survival is not just my personal success, but it is the success of KwaZulu-Natal as an autonomous political system, which wishes to employ its distinctiveness to excel and lead by example.

In light of the successes of our province, which I will highlight very briefly today, one can only express both amusement and pity for the pathetic attempts of certain leaders who have made the statement that at the next elections, our province should fall in their hands so as to complete its liberation. These are the same people who hold more than two-thirds majority of the votes in the Eastern Cape and Limpopo, where they have given ample proof of the full measure of their incompetence to govern, their inefficiency and their incapability to curb corruption. That is not the type of backward and regressive administration our province seeks.

We are not going to go backward but we shall move forward on the path we have chosen, which has proven to be successful, not only for KwaZulu-Natal, but for the whole of South Africa. In fact, if KwaZulu-Natal were to fall prey to those who have so brilliantly given proof of mismanagement in places like the Eastern Cape and Limpopo, and have excelled in the art of failure throughout the country, the doors would be wide open not only to the rapid consolidation of a one-party state, but also to a downward spiral of poor administration, corruption, government waste and incompetence.

KwaZulu-Natal has become the battlefield for the survival of democracy in South Africa, as well as for the maintenance of standards of excellence in government and morality and accountability in politics. I would invite the President of the Republic of South Africa, who is focusing so much of his attention on KwaZulu-Natal, to focus a greater measure of his attention and concern on the many provinces on which his party is failing so dramatically and let this province do the job in which it is excelling.

When I became the Premier of this province, I made a commitment to bring to the province absolute financial soundness, to avoid diverting scarce financial resources away from our most pressing needs. Since the beginning of 2001 our province has been debt free, which has enabled us to employ available resources for development and infrastructure. We have developed adequate capacity to spend the funding we have and to manage our government in such a way that we can deliver efficiently and effectively. For this reason, as the Premier of KwaZulu-Natal, I am duty bound not only to express my personal anger but also to voice the anger of the people of our province, for the fact that the central government would not give us the full measure of funding we need to rollout anti-retroviral (ARV) drugs to all those infected by HIV who need them, and would not do so not because we do not have the capacity of spending this money, but because other provinces cannot do so.

It is obvious that the central government is not serious about fighting the war on HIV/AIDS and providing the basic needs of people who suffer. We need to look at this issue across the party political divide and as men and women of conscience. All people in this House must recognise that this conduct on the side of the central government is wrong and immoral, even though it comes from their own party's colleagues and leaders. People are suffering and they must be helped. There is no reason not to help them, when we have the capacity to do so, merely because of the wishes and whims of political leaders who have long lost the credibility and the legitimacy of leading our country in the war against HIV/AIDS. I urge my colleagues in this House who have different political persuasions to my own, to look at this issue through the hearts and sufferings of our HIV/AIDS infected or affected population and not in terms of party political allegiance. Let us stop defending the indefensible. Let us force the central government to stop delaying the full rollout of ARV drugs. Let us try to do more in our province to move forward with the war on HIV/AIDS. Today KwaZulu-Natal is a leader in the war on HIV/AIDS and we must ensure that, with the support of all the members of this House, irrespective of party political affiliation, we can indeed do more and better in bringing relief to the many who are suffering.

Today KwaZulu-Natal is also a province in which peace and reconciliation have taken root. Our people are reconciled and seek nothing but peace and prosperity. It is despicable that there are still leaders who are trying to raise the spectre of violence to further their political agenda and achieve through violence and intimidation what they cannot gain by means of serene political debate. Violence is the expression of the greed of political leaders moved by political despair. It is essential that our people isolate violence at the elections and punish severely those who have resorted to violence, assassination and intimidation. It will be the people of KwaZulu-Natal who shall say the final no to violence by making people who resort to it understand that never again will this province be drawn into the downward spiral of violence and that the spectre of violence is buried once and forever. Those who continue to speak about violence and those who employ violence and perpetrate the cowardly, deplorable and despicable assassinations, which have tainted our political life in the past ten days, will be defeated by all the people of KwaZulu-Natal who will undoubtedly say a resounding no against them on election day. I hope that this House will join me in condemning anyone who continues to speak about the possibility of violence in our province and hopes to evoke again the spectre of violence.

I urge our police to join hands with our communities to ensure that our election campaign is free of any incidents of violence. The Department of Safety and Security is now investigating allegations that in recent incidents of political violence and political assassinations the police not only did not do enough to prevent these incidents, but they might even have withdrawn from the scene beforehand, in order for such hideous assassinations to be facilitated. These are very serious allegations on the merits of which I shall not pronounce myself but which must be investigated to the full and, if need be, must lead to the prosecution of anyone found guilty of dereliction of duty.

Our Department of Safety and Security has performed well in the past year, even though its powers and functions are extremely limited by the Constitution. It is unconscionable that in a province like ours, our Department of Safety and Security would not have the power to organise, direct and deploy the police and would be limited to only being a watchdog of what the police whom actually do. However, in our function of being watchdogs, whom we have been effective and we will continue to be so in the interest of our communities. We have the highest possible respect for our police. We know that our men and women in uniform are doing their best in protecting our lives and property. We are indebted to them and we wish we were in the position to do more for them. If, as the Premier of this province, I had the power, which our province should have, to structure our own provincial police, I would undoubtedly hire a much larger number of policemen and women and would pay them better and provide them with much greater resources, because it is no understatement to say that our lives depend on them.

In the past year the Department of Safety and Security has addressed the state of readiness of the police by assessing 92 out of the 183 police stations. We also spent R1,8 million in developing community police fora, which may help the police with administrative work, so as to free the police scarce resources so that they may be directed towards investigative activities. The money we spent has been a mere catalyst of a very broad private public partnership, the main contribution of which came from the free and voluntary work of all our community members. This has shown that the partnership against crime is working. We need to continue the efforts of ensuring that in each community, criminal conduct is no longer tolerated and its perpetrators are isolated and exposed. However, we must also work on the other side of the equation and eradicate the culture of crime from the hearts and minds of our people.

We need to intensify programmes of civic education to make an ever growing number of people understand the difference between right and wrong and that crime does not pay. This new emphasis will characterise the activities we intend to promote through community police fora in the next year. We aim at making these fora more proactive in a campaign of civic education. The partnership with business in the fight against crime has also been successful. Next year we wish to move it forward to ensure that it also extends into civic education. We must not only provide civic education in our schools to ensure that our children grow up in a law-abiding culture that rejects crime, but we must also provide it in workplaces to ensure that adult basic education and training programmes are aimed at forging better citizens who recognise the value of the law and reject crime while becoming active participants in the fight against crime alongside the police. Next year we will extend the number of community fora and we will renew our efforts to forge a much larger number of partnerships with the business community, as well as other institutions of civil society, such as churches and private associations, which can also become outlets for civic education programmes.

I must register my disquiet and the disquiet of the people of KwaZulu-Natal for the fact that the central government has thus far failed in its obligation of appointing a Commissioner for our province, in spite of the fact that the interviews have taken place, the relevant consultation has been performed and the candidate has been finally identified. It is obvious that the central government is giving another sign that it is just not serious about fighting crime in this province and does not regard the fight against crime as an urgent priority for our people, otherwise one could not explain why it just does not go ahead with the job of appointing the chief policeman for our province. I care about the fight against crime and I speak so frankly and bluntly because I cannot fathom how people could be careless on matters of such great importance.

My administration wishes to be tough not only on crime, but also on the causes of crime. We are deeply aware that crime is part and parcel of a vast human tragedy, which affects large segments of our population. It stems out of poverty, despair and abject social and economic conditions. We cannot fight crime without fighting its root causes. Indeed the worst of all crimes is poverty itself. The abject social and economic conditions in which the majority of our people still dwell is the real crime against humanity, which together we must recognise and develop a long-term plan to redress. Only in this fashion will our fight against crime be legitimate and credible. I urge all the people of KwaZulu-Natal to recognise this connection and join hands with me to be tough on the causes of crime, and work with me to eliminate poverty and conditions of human despair and hopelessness, which often forces people into a life of crime.

It is not only I who must care, because I alone, cannot solve the problem. We must develop a culture in our province where we all care beyond tokenism and perfunctory charitable social activities. We need to roll up our sleeves and continue in our work of poverty alleviation and social and economic development, as if there were no other priority. This is an obligation which must be assumed by anyone in our province, because until the plight of the poor is fully redressed, there will be no security or long-term prosperity for the rich.

Economic development remains one of my administration's main goals and priorities. In this respect, I am pleased to highlight the achievements in the past year of our Department of Economic Development and Tourism under its new political leadership, which highlights how much can be secured for our provinces through the co-operation of like-minded partners. When people work together for the same goals and on the strength of the same vision, our province prospers, while our province suffers when people participating in my Cabinet undermine and frustrate our government. The Department of Economic Development and Tourism has taken seriously its task of promoting economic growth and through its actions, a number of investments have been facilitated in the fields of wood and furniture, clothing and textiles, aluminium and steel, petrol and chemicals, tourism, agro-processing and transport and logistics, which have created in excess of a thousand new direct jobs, which may have an overall impact on employment generation in excess of twenty thousand indirect new job opportunities for our citizens.

Our Development Finance Corporation, Ithala, has provided development financing conducive to the establishment of 557 new business enterprises in all sectors, including 220 in the micro and small business sector, and has facilitated the creation of an additional 967 direct new employment opportunities, while financing the development of 2 375 hectares of agricultural land, and the financing of home loans for 3 317 first time homeowners. We have extended extensive support to small, medium and micro enterprises through the Manufacturing Advisory Centre Programme which, through its various interventions, has created an additional 1 109 new direct job opportunities and sustained 20 468 jobs in the fields of chemicals, footwear and leather, metal and allied, agro-processing, clothing and textiles, automotive components, capital equipment and electrical products. We have forged a partnership programme with the European Commission, which is meant to provide value in excess of 37 million euro over six years to fund local economic development initiatives in communities, to begin the cycle of development. This shows that our province is increasingly getting down to work and is growing by means of it.

Our Department of Economic Development and Tourism has also completed a draft strategic plan and programme for the development of a specifically KwaZulu-Natal industrial basis. We have often regretted that South Africa as a whole still does not have a coherent and consistent plan for the development of industrial basis, which may identify today what product we will be producing for the global markets in twenty years. We are trying to correct this major deficiency in the central government's macro economic policies by at least identifying today what KwaZulu-Natal will be producing in twenty years, so that we can begin promoting an adequate industrial basis to ensure the employment and prosperity of our children and their children's children.

We are rising to the responsibility of looking today at tomorrow's future. In this sense the department has been active on promoting the culture of entrepreneurship amongst the youth, promoting a number of initiatives to facilitate access by youth to business opportunities. To this end the Department has allocated R2,6 million to establish a business incubator focusing on young entrepreneurs.

The department has taken very seriously not only its mission in respect of economic development, but also the one in respect of tourism. My administration firmly believes that together with the green revolution, to which I will refer later, tourism holds the greatest potential for massive short-term employment generation in our province. Therefore, no efforts must be spared in order to promote it. To this end, after extensive marketing research, the Department decided to brand our tourist activities and potential under the label of the Zulu Kingdom. This was done to capitalise to the full on the tourism potential of our province, to enable more of our people to access a free and dignified life through employment. I am flabbergasted and disgusted that irresponsible, ill-informed and superficial commentators used this marketing exercise to state that I have renamed our province in terms of the Constitution. We are proud of our province being the Zulu Kingdom and that it is perceived as such in the entire world. This is an image that gives us pride and brings us benefits. Therefore, it is a sign of political desperation to try to turn this very successful marketing exercise into a political issue. We need to ensure that we do not allow politics to jeopardise what can be done to give much-needed jobs to our people.

It is my intention to provide leadership to an administration that is devoted to employment generation throughout all its activities, but which does so in a sensible, sustainable and rational manner. This commitment will drive our administration after the next elections and is the basis on which we are seeking the renewal of our mandate. This commitment has also underpinned the activities of the Department of Works during the past year. The Department of Works has been supporting the activities of our government by providing services such as building and construction, maintenance of buildings, professional advisory services and property acquisition and disposal on the basis of service level agreements with most of the provincial departments, including its major clients of Education and Health.

As our vision is aimed at providing our government and the people of our province with the best value for money, we have instructed that these activities be conducted both within the parameters of the Department of Works and by means of private-public partnerships so that, for instance, schools may be built either directly by our government or through the financial contribution of the private sector. Even in respect of direct construction or maintenance of buildings, I have encouraged the Department of Works to operate as a general contractor so as to ensure the best value for money, best quality of services and maximum flexibility.

This policy will be pursued more aggressively during the next financial year. In the past financial year R452 million was allocated and spent on the construction of new schools and R961 million on new buildings especially in respect of hospitals and hospital additions. The hospital revitalisation programme was funded from a conditional grant and included the now advanced upgrading of King George V Hospital for an estimated cost of R350 million, the construction of two new 300-bed district hospitals in the Inanda, Ntuzuma, KwaMashu area of the eThekwini district, and the redevelopment of the Ngwelezane and lower Umfolozi War Memorial Hospitals in Empangeni for an estimated R150 million.

Over the past three years the growth of the Department of Works has been significantly rising from a budget of R441 million in the 2001/2002 financial year, to a budget of R893 million in the 2003/2004 financial year. The department will keep up the pace of this increased volume of work in the 2004/2005 financial year and some of its major scheduled projects include the construction of a new depot in Madadeni, the construction of a new district office in Ixopo, a district office accommodation in Eshowe, works depot and district office in Nongoma, a new regional office in Ulundi, an extension to the district office in Newcastle, and an extension to the district office in Ladysmith. This internal expansion will enable the department to keep up with the increased volume of work in an environment in which increasingly more is expected of it.

I have urged the department to utilise this internal expansion to enable it to expand its external activities, not only by means of direct operations, but first and foremost by acting as a general contractor in private-public partnerships, thereby building on successful past experience. In fact, in the past year a number of successful cooperative ventures have taken place, including the appointment of Ithala Development Finance Corporation in terms of which Ithala would invite tenders and programme-manage the construction of eleven new schools to the value of R100 million, and the agreement with the Independent Development Trust (IDT) in terms of which the IDT will invite tenders, and project manage a further 69 new school building projects to the value of R40 million. Moreover, one must mention the valuable private-public partnership with the Divine Life Society of South Africa, which has built a large number of schools within the parameters of what remains an example of private sector's contribution to government functions.

The Department of Housing has also given its contribution in pursuing government functions either directly, or as a general contractor or by means of private-public partnerships. During the 2003/2004 financial year the Province upgraded 803 single units and 1,370 family units in KwaDabeka hostel in Pinetown, 44 family units in Sibongile hostel in Dundee and 15 units in Shakaville hostel in Stanger, just to mention a few. More work is in progress as 240 family units are being upgraded at the Sibongile hostel, and in the coming year the province will upgrade 100 single units and 51 family units in the Sithembile hostel, 168 family units in KwaMashu hostel in Durban and 160 family units in Dalton Road hostel in Durban. At the same time, within the parameters of our culture of self-help and self-reliance the Department of Housing has pursued the People Housing Processes Programme known as PHP, which is a self-help programme that highlights the enormous advantages of the doing-it-yourself approach.

The province has approved 84 projects under this programme which, when completed, will house 71,521 families. The size and output of this programme shows how government can best perform by helping people to help themselves, becoming a catalyst and enabling factor of progress generated by others. Along the same lines, the Department of Housing has conducted capacity building and training programmes in the form of housing consumer education and the establishment of housing components in municipalities. Amongst such projects one must give special mention to the Flanders project, which is a donor-funded pilot project in selected municipalities, enabling municipalities to take up housing functions and provide housing consumer education. Under this programme, the amount of R864,000 has been set aside to establish housing components in the selected municipalities with an additional R5 million having been agreed to in principle for future expenditure. I have promoted the Flanders project as a Premier's initiative to highlight the value for our province and our citizens of our philosophy and government practice of devolution of power to municipalities that has always inspired us, as this project flows out of a memorandum of understanding that I signed with the Flanders Government in December 2000.

My government is committed to providing our needy people with housing. At present 805 houses are under construction in Madadeni K-2, 416 in Slovas KwaMbonambi, 1 400 in KwaMathukusa, 410 in Dlamini Lindelani, 500 in Jozini as part of the slum clearance projects, while more of such projects are under consideration for Mtikini, Vryheid Extension 16 and Osizweni Phase 3. All these projects are part of the northern region slum clearance project while, in the Coastal region, eight slums were cleared benefiting 13 184 people and in the Inland region in the Edendale Unit H Embleton Phase 2 slum clearance project 2 077 sites have been developed with 1 585 houses having been built and delivered, 27 houses being under construction and 465 houses remaining to be completed, In the Edendale Unit H, 2 670 sites have been developed in what will be the second stage of this important project with 2 531 houses remaining to be built, 44 being under construction and 95 having been delivered. My government remains committed to answering to the call of need of the segments of our population who live in abject social and economic conditions. In the next financial year we will give new emphasis to ensuring that the poorest of the poor can live in conditions that respect their humanity and dignity and are provided with housing and shelter.

The prompt answer to the call of need of the least protected segments of our population has been and remains the mission statement of our Department of Social Welfare and Population Development. Together with the Department of Home Affairs our Department of Social Welfare has strengthened its registration campaign for social grants with particular focus on children. Through this rigorous effort a much larger number of beneficiaries has been reached moving from about 695 000 to 986 000 beneficiaries. As part of our eradication of poverty and inequality, payments for social grants are approximately R700 million a month, which our government distributes with efficiency and effectiveness. We are seriously concerned about the attempts of the national government to centralise this function, which will inevitably cause inefficiency, either forcing people to apply for their benefits to Pretoria, or leading to the creation of a huge network of regional offices. Our province is committed to maintaining the management of social grants in a localised fashion, which is consumer friendly and consonant with our culture and practice of devolution of powers, because we believe that people come first and they should be served where they are, rather than forcing them to go where government chooses to be.

For this reason, the Department of Social Welfare will continue to work with municipalities and traditional authorities to ensure that people may be reached in the manner that is most caring and accommodating. We need to do more to give substance to our commitment to care about people who suffer. For instance, I am very concerned that the national government refuses to consider people with full-blown AIDS as suffering of a disability. An essential component of our war against HIV/AIDS must be that of caring for those who are so afflicted and treat them on an equal level with those who have a different type of impairing disability. We will carry their cause forward in our negotiations with the central government to ensure that their disability may be recognised.

The Department of Social Welfare and Population Development has also championed our culture and practice of self-help and self-reliance to contribute towards the alleviation of poverty by enabling people to help themselves. We have spent R96 million in self-reliance programmes to enable people to achieve food security and escape the poverty trap. These programmes have involved the establishment of not-for-profit organisations and the mobilisation of 2 000 youth, 450 unemployed women, 55 elders and 76 men in poverty pockets of the province who are meant to become active engines of growth and development for their respective communities. The department continues to manage 750 developmental projects targeting in excess of 16 000 people, and provides accredited training to approximately 500 people in two functional development centres. Fifteen flagship programmes target approximately 1 500 unemployed women with young children with further self-reliance and empowerment opportunities. The partnership programmes together with the flagship programmes have become an important component of our integrated development plans for rural and marginalized communities. Within these plans we have been rolling out the National Food Emergency Programme and the total of 7 000 households have benefited from it.

The Department of Welfare has made a major contribution in managing the impact of HIV/AIDS and reducing its spread. Thirty-two social growth centres have been identified and developed to include income generating activities at their sites leading to 2 255 beneficiaries having been assisted, services being provided to 2 152 orphaned children or children who are at risk of becoming orphans, while paying 968 people for casual employment.

This major effort in our war against HIV/AIDS has been upgraded from R27,4 million in the 2002/2003 financial year to R68.1 million for the 2003/2004 financial year, and in addition has included a variety of projects ranging from support groups for people living with HIV/AIDS, to the training of volunteers for home-based care and support of basic counselling skills to educational programmes for more than 4 000 women who should in turn become engines of further education in their communities.

The Department of Welfare has reflected the attitude of my government of reaching out to the people by going to them, rather than forcing them to come to us. This philosophy has been exemplified by the "open days" or "Ilima", which are programmes of delivering services directly to the needy in our province that has caused a massive decline in complaints from our customers. Obviously, there is need to do more, and do it more effectively and we will carry forward this commitment into the next financial year because we are aware that we are still fighting with minuscule resources to redress a vast sea of unfulfilled needs. In this effort we must ensure that none of our scarce resources are wasted and we will increase our fight against fraud and corruption, which in the past years has been so successful. In the past year 150 employees of the Department of Social Welfare have been trained in special investigation courses to deal with cases of fraud and mismanagement of funds in the department.

The Department of Education and Culture has registered significant improvements in its performance as we have seen an improvement in the senior certificate examination results from 61,7% in 1996, to 70,8% in 2002, to 77,5% in 2003. This was achieved through concerted efforts by all role-players. The Department of Education and Culture has continued to promote a culture of learning and teaching throughout its institutions. Today the overwhelming number of our schools is fully resourced with classrooms, furniture, textbooks and stationery. The department has reached out into communities, developing sports facilities in almost all schools and making them available beyond the school's perimeter. The pace and quality of delivery in the field of education is increasing together with greater value for money spent. Furthermore, the ratio of expenditure between personnel and infrastructural costs is improving. After many years, in which we had to try to catch up with the backlog in education, we are now in the position of beginning to harvest the fruits of our investments. We finally have a headcount on the actual numbers of learners, which will enable better planning and have developed stringent procedures to prevent corruption and mismanagement as part of my administration's overall commitment against crime and corruption. We are moving towards having a leaner bureaucracy within the Department of Education so as to ensure that our resources go where they are meant to be, which is in teachers, books and classrooms.

Also in this field great emphasis is placed and will continue to be placed in devolution to regions and districts. The Department of Education has also given a major contribution to our war on HIV/AIDS spending R12 million in programmes that distribute information on the pandemic and the disease. The department also conducted a study into the impact of HIV/AIDS and related morbidity and mortality together with the effects of tuberculosis, drugs and alcohol abuse, violence and trauma and other factors. From the basis which we have now acquired, we will move forward in making public education in KwaZulu-Natal a South African flagship of excellence, to which end in the next financial year we shall call for public and expert inputs to begin a process of policy formulation to reassess the curriculum to be taught in our province, to determine how we can improve on the national one. For too long we have been held back by the backlog we inherited in the field of education and we are now in the position of using the same pace, which enabled us to overcome the backlog, to produce visible excellence in our education system and create a new vision. We want to make KwaZulu-Natal a place in which children can receive the best public education available in the country because I firmly believe that no investment is too large when made in our children's future, and no greater gift can be bequeathed and bestowed on our children than that of learning, knowledge and education.

The field of agricultural development is another one in which we can rightly expect KwaZulu-Natal to remain a leader in the whole of South Africa. Our programme of mechanisation, which provides tractors and technical assistance to farmers, has been identified by the national government as an example for all other provinces. The mechanisation programme gives mobility to emerging and small-scale farmers across the board. The Department of Agriculture and Environmental Affairs has also worked on poverty alleviation programmes, which have established 1 520 food security projects throughout the province reaching approximately 50 400 beneficiaries. The department has also conducted an extensive programme of farmer support and is fully involved in a mentorship programme to assist emerging farmers. These are some of the premises of the green revolution that we wish to promote in our province and that will remain high on our agenda for the next years. The green revolution is not only about enabling new commercial farmers to emerge. It is our intention to enable the voluntary conversion of the agricultural bases of our province from non-labour intensive, land intensive and low-added value crops such as sugar cane, to labour intensive, non-land intensive and high-added value produce such as nuts, spices, avocado pears and tropical fruits. This programme will free land for the creation through market forces of smaller agricultural productive units, which produce greater yields and allow the emergence of a new class of farmers. We believe that through the action of government, which may finance the cost of land conversion and operate as a catalyst of progress, market forces can produce the transformation of our agriculture to place us in the position of supplying world markets with high added value and niche market products. The green revolution also remains the greatest hope we have for massive employment generation in our province within the short and medium term.

In respect of the environment I am pleased to announce that our Province has six blue flag beaches out of the eight that have been recognised in our country for their internationally accepted high standards of facilities amenities and cleanliness. Our environmental assets are being properly safeguarded and managed. Several rehabilitation programmes are on track, which ensure that KwaZulu-Natal remains a leader in nature conservation and environmental management. It is our intention to move forward in the field of environmental management, considering a number of initiatives in the regulatory field to ensure that the quality of human environment continues to improve for our citizens.

I also need to record successes in our provincial Treasury. The Treasury has been able to adjust our spending in compliance with our stated policies and priorities. We are satisfied not only that our government has now the right priorities, but also that our spending patterns are reflecting them. Eradication of poverty and inequality and our war on HIV/AIDS have been our top priorities together with investing in infrastructure, developing human capabilities and strengthening governments so as to achieve further economic growth and generate employment. Promoting rural development and urban renewal and investing in job-creating economic growth have been steady priorities, which have been pursued, through adequately prioritised provincial spending, in a relentless manner. I must therefore praise the provincial Treasury for the efficiency with which it has enabled our administration to perform in a manner, which remains exemplary throughout South Africa.

Our efforts to provide poverty alleviation have also characterised many of the actions of the Department of Traditional Affairs and Local Government. Amongst the many programmes conducted by this department, to provide social safety nets for the poor, is the provision of free basic water in 40 municipalities within the province to enable 4,9 million of our citizens to benefit from it. The roll out of free basic electricity has been a more involved and complicated process that, however, remains on our agenda for the future. Thus far, about 300 000 eligible households have been identified throughout the province in 51 local municipalities. The challenge to bring electricity to all our citizens remains very high on our agenda as only 53% of KwaZulu-Natal is presently electrified. We continue to invest in infrastructure and, indeed, we are leaders within the country in this respect, as our municipal infrastructure programme has increased by leaps and bounds since I became the Premier of this province.

I am pleased to announce that 100% of the R540 million grant for 2003/2004 will be utilised by the end of the fiscal year and that the full allocation for the 2004/2005 and 2005/2006 financial years will be well in excess of R1 billion and has already been committed to the consolidated municipal infrastructure programme and its approved related projects. This expenditure in infrastructure is expected to become not only an engine of growth for our province, but also a major opportunity for employment generation. The projects to be so financed will include 305 water projects, 110 sanitation projects, 277 road projects, 23 solid waste projects, 41 community lighting projects, 18 storm water management projects, 83 community facility projects and 47 municipal capacity building projects, which give the image of how much our province is at work, is growing and is determined to succeed.

Emphasis has also been placed and will continue to be placed on the transformation and upgrading of traditional structures, from traditional courts to traditional administrative centres, which are receiving growing attention, not only from the Department of Traditional Affairs and Local Government, but also from other departments wanting to bring their services to remote rural communities. The development of human capability and the strengthening of governance have become embedded in a number of programmes of the Department of Traditional Affairs and Local Government and will continue to remain an item of great emphasis on our agenda for future action.

Poverty alleviation projects have also been conducted by our health services within the parameters of their mission, together with integrated nutrition programmes. To date 2 914 primary schools with 1 221 000 learners participate in the primary school nutrition programme, thereby recognising the importance of preventative medicine and health education as part of a successful management of public health within our province. Community disease control continues to be a priority in our province with special emphasis on tuberculosis control in all our clinics. It is our intention to promote greater partnerships between the public and the private sector to enrol the assistance of clinics within workplaces to ensure greater success in the fight against tuberculosis as well as in our war against HIV/AIDS. Today 100% of all our maternity hospitals have finally rolled out the prevention of mother-to-child transmission programme, which we fought for, to the point of participating in litigation before the Constitutional Court, to ensure that our children could be saved from the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Since we declared war on HIV/AIDS in 2002 great progress has been made in this respect.

However, I am still not satisfied by what has been done, because I am aware of how much more needs to be done. I am very concerned that the central government is still delaying the full roll out of ARV drugs because other provinces would not have the capacity of spending the relevant funding when our province has it. We will need to become even more pro-active in our war against HIV/AIDS because we can no longer be held back by the inefficiency of others when we have the responsibility of doing what we can to respond to the call of need of our people. I am also very concerned about the fact that many of the central government health policies remain characterized by a degree of demagoguery and lack of pragmatism, which is making things worse. In our province we will give serious consideration to adopting different policies in respect of doctors and the public health system.

It is not our philosophy to create rules and an entire system of governance in which medical doctors cannot provide their essential services to our communities and are not free and entitled to the protection, which the Constitution extends to all professions. We will explore what can be done through the laws of our province to ensure that KwaZulu-Natal can deliver top quality public health services in a framework which respects the needs and aspirations of medical doctors and patients alike. We are willing to receive relevant suggestions from the doctors in this respect. We will build on the past successes to go forward on our war on HIV/AIDS by calling on our entire provincial community to provide its contribution at all levels of our society. I remain convinced that our success in the war against HIV/AIDS will enable us to achieve a deep unity within our province, which can forge the basis of its future success. We need to strengthen the ties of social solidarity and begin working together to succeed in this great challenge so that the basis will be laid for us to do the same in the many other challenges we will undoubtedly encounter and overcome as our province moves forward.

The Department of Transport remains committed to its mission to provide improved road infrastructure. I wish to mention the upgrading of Main Road 235 from Mtubatuba up to Hlabisa. This project is valued at R48 million. It is intended that the next construction phase will focus on the stretch between Hlabisa and Nongoma. Construction work on Road P700 is in progress. The upgraded P700 will link Ulundi through the iMfolozi Game Park to Richard's Bay. Thus there will be greater internal communication and access to our tourism assets and facilities. The development of this road infrastructure will make a significant contribution to our economic growth. The Department of Transport has also developed the Vukuzakhe emerging contractor programme which aims at becoming an engine of economic growth within our province and has now a value of R370 million for the 2003/4 financial year. This programme is expected to create 30 000 new jobs. The Department of Transport takes the view that their Vukuzakhe initiative is labour intensive.

The Department of Transport has also launched important campaigns to protect all our citizens from the great risks associated with driving. The department takes the view that roads should be safe. This will require increasing the levels of law enforcement on the roads, ranging from controlling the speed of vehicles to ensuring that drunken driving seizes to be a threat to human lives. There is also an obligation to achieve greater compliance with the rules governing commercial transport by trucks. The clamp down on the violation of rules by heavy transport operators has earned this province respect.

The Department of the Premier, and all its components, will remain committed in being at the stewardship of this province and ensuring policy co-ordination in the years to come. We are pleased with the way in which the Department of the Royal Household is now creating a framework of security and accountability for the management of matters relating to the monarchy, which is a valuable institution for the whole of our province. The Department of the Premier will continue to conduct the type of provincial international relations, which have thus far proved to be so successful in promoting our province's economic growth. I am also pleased that the process of regulating our gambling industry has now achieved another milestone. We have fought to maintain the competence of our province to regulate its own gambling machines by means of a provincial electronic central monitoring system. After many legal controversies our right to do so has been recognised and this project is now being finalized with the contract having been awarded and a service level agreement having been signed. We are now in the position of rolling out route and site licences for gambling devices.

The Office of the Premier has also continued to conduct many activities to ensure that the constitutional prerogatives of our province continue to be preserved from the encroachment of actions of policies of the central level of government. We have conducted successful constitutional litigation and we will continue to do so to ensure that the Constitution is respected in that which pertains to the allocation of powers between the national and the provincial levels of government, and in so doing we know that we are conducting a battle which is not only in the interests of KwaZulu-Natal but it is, indeed, in the interests of all other provinces and essential to democracy in our country.

Our province is committed to promoting constitutionalism and drafting a provincial Constitution to redefine the parameters of its government. Obviously the task of drafting a Constitution for the province will need to be attended to by the next Parliament. However, it is my intention to appoint at this juncture a commission of technical experts who can assist in the process, do the groundwork and be ready to facilitate the adoption of a Constitution should the next Parliament decide that there is a need to have one on an urgent basis after the elections. I will choose and appoint such experts after having consulted with the leaders of all political parties so as to ensure that the overall composition of the commission of experts is acceptable to all parties.

From the Office of the Premier we will continue to maintain the stewardship of our war against HIV/AIDS. Following on the HIV/AIDS Indaba we will soon establish a Section 21 Company which will co-ordinate the war against HIV/AIDS in close co-operation with funding from foreign governments and donor institutions as well as our Department of Health. This entity will be capable of receiving direct foreign and donor funding thereby eliminating some of the bureaucratic hindrances that have been placed on receiving money for much needed relief for greatly suffering people. It will also enable donors to achieve a much greater level of confidence and direct supervision on how their money is actually spent and programmes conducted as the donors themselves will be part and parcel of the management structure of this entity. I am pleased that this initiative is now coming on line to show that the HIV/AIDS Indaba was successful in producing tangible results and moving our war on HIV/AIDS forward.

As the Premier of this Province it is my commitment to continue to maintain this province on course ensuring that after the investment we have made, we can now begin harvesting the fruits of our policies. In the next few years we will undoubtedly see great progress on our war against HIV/AIDS and in the poverty alleviation programmes. You will also see how the compound effect of our many programmes, aimed at producing further economic growth, will begin generating employment and create a level of prosperity for all. We remain committed to a clean and effective administration and good governance. We also remain committed to ensuring that our Province can move forward with the contribution of all.

We need to reach greater internal unity within our province and within this House. We can no longer allow political divisions to undermine our joint efforts to promote economic growth, generate employment, alleviate poverty and fight HIV/AIDS. When people undermine my government they are effectively undermining these projects and I must urge all the Members of this House to join hands with us to ensure that our province can be a success. We must all be the authors of this success and I am proud to recognise that, in fact, the success of my administration is to be shared amongst all the Members of this House. We have done well and we will continue to do well because we are, and we all want to remain, part of the same success story.

Since I took office as the Premier of this province I have called for the unity of all those who wish to be part of the solution to our many problems and will continue to do so in the years to come. Let us work together because, by working together, we can do justice to the mission we have and we can take pride in our work. I respect the contributions that I know all the Members of this House can make towards the success of this province. I look forward to doing what I can to continue to work with each of the Members of this House in the most constructive, positive and beneficial manner.

I pray to God Almighty to continue to inspire our actions and bless the Province of KwaZulu-Natal for its sake and for the sake of progress and democracy in the whole of South Africa.

I thank you.

Issued by: Office of the Premier, KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Government
16 February 2004

Source: KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Government (http://www.kwazulunatal.gov.za)