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27 June 2008

'It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer could have done better.'

Madam Speaker
Premier Edna B Molewa
Members of the legislature
A special and true friend to the North West province, Mr Yousuf Al Hammadi
President of the Emirates Aviation Association
My two Child Ambassadors whom we take to work today
All transport stakeholders
The Head of Department, SMS members and the general staff
The Community of the North West
Ladies and gentlemen
Comrades and friends

It is perhaps befitting Madam Speaker, to start by examining why it is necessary for us to think collectively about a problem we never created! In our quest to find a solution, we should not only concern ourselves about who caused it but rather what we should do about it! But to get to the right answers, we must ask the right questions. We must possess the ability to distinguish the truth from the deliberate creation of an artificial fabrication of the true facts.

These fabrications are orchestrated by power-hungry people whose supreme motive is personal wealth, the unwitting extension of the past disguised in countless forms of purported good at the expense of our historic mandate of a truly non-racial, non-sexist and democratic South Africa.

The truth in the sense I have accepted since my first breath 43 years ago, is in actual fact at the heart of selfless patriots and revolutionaries of our motherland in whose spilt blood we serve for the common good. The truth calls on men and women of courage to establish a consensus of action against the ills of our society. It is the truth that drives our consciousness of mind and a way of life. Its essence is not to remain unaffected by poor, slow and wasteful application as we go about delivering services.

We must present an open admiration of intolerance to lack, poor and or wasteful service delivery standing true to our calling of service to our people.

Madam Speaker, we undertake this troubled journey mindful that 'It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer could have done better'.

The credit belongs to the man in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly who knows the great enthusiasm; the great devotions, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at best knows in the end the triumph of high achievements, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring gently, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who have never known neither victory nor defeat!' I have deemed it appropriate to borrow these piercing words of Teddy Roosevelt to illustrate the road ahead.

The past two weeks have seen the emergence of xenophobic attacks in some parts of the country. Our province has also experienced such attacks in a number of areas. There have been 37 incidents of violence on foreign nationals and 143 arrests have been made across the province. The instruction to South African Police Service (SAPS) is that they must protect the property and lives of those affected by these attacks. The Crime Intelligence Unit has been deployed in all areas for any information gathering on these attacks or threats. We have reactivated the Crime Combating Units to ensure that such incidents do not occur. We will again continue to engage communities in an attempt to deal with such kind of behaviour.

There are three desires I find written so deeply in the hearts of many citizens living and visiting the North West province which we cannot disregard without losing our soul. They are core to what we are and what we yearn to be:

* a crime free North West province
* a multi-modal public transport system (bus, rail and air) geared towards economic and social integration of our communities
* an improved road network system – free of potholes, a bit wider, linking rural communities with economic hubs and last but not least, creating jobs in the process of our road construction and maintenance programme.

Fighting crime in the province

'Taking the fight against crime to the doorsteps of criminals'

Madam Speaker, I challenge your August house to take the fight against crime to the doorsteps of criminals themselves. We need to go straight to the hearts of the fearful because life lived in fear is no life at all! We are outraged by crime. We need to stop the tiptoe around crime avoiding rocking the comfort of our troubled boat, and we need to stop dropping the subject about the aftermath of crime to preserve the so-called 'image of a beautiful country!'

Our country suffers violent crimes even when crime is generally on a downward trend and violent criminals take away our safety by force. We have a battle to fight! Finally, we must stand up to the criminal tyrants.

The crime we meet in our street corners, in places of entertainment, in shopping malls, in cash transit heists, in the ATMs that are bombed, in the quiet of our rural homestead and, of course, in the comfort of our homes, does not only exist on an individual basis. It is planned, resourced and executed with precision by both amateur and professional criminals alike to make it look like a South African way of life. I want to go a little deeper in illustrating how criminals, by skillful craft, are out to undermine the effort to fight crime and bring us to our knees.

I remember, as most of our Honourable members would, arriving in the quiet of a rural village of Pella in the Madikwe area, about 45km from Swartruggens on Monday morning of the 6 August 2007 and taken through a crime scene of a 13 year old boy Bahumi Mogorosi whose hand was savagely amputated; genitals ripped off; lips and tongue cut off whilst with wide open and pleading eyes he watched in disbelief, the barbaric hands of two adult men in the name of ritual practice!

In a matter of a month after the first gruesome discovery of the little Bahumi, two bodies of Titus Lesejane and David Letsedi were picked up mutilated with the last one leading us to the successful investigation, apprehension and now underway trial of Patrick Lesejane and Ephraim Selane, with the former being the brother to one of the victims. Life has produced one of the most heartless beasts of our time.

As these ritual murders reared their ugly face, Pella was awakened to an old scar of unsolved ritual murders that cut the community in the middle leaving deep seated suspicion covered by many years passed. The suspects directly and indirectly by wily craft, led the community into an emotionally charged build-up conflict with the police to divert us from the real truth. Thanks to God, we became indestructible and steadfastly remained focused amidst great provocation.
Thanks to the able Police Task Team led by Director Jan Mabula who unravelled the web of deceit. Thanks to the Community leaders and the Pella residents for putting their trust and lives in our hands under difficult circumstances.

'It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer could have done better!

Let me also take you to the hurting truth of a three year old baby girl, Boitumelo Happiness Maripane, of Majakaneng village in the Madibeng Local Municipality who on the 8th February this year (2008) went missing! All of our questions of her whereabouts over 10 days were answered in a devastating way! It was a Sunday morning of the 17th February 2008 that the police team led me to the gruesome find of a decomposing tiny body of Boitumelo.

Her mother, like all loving mothers of our motherland would do, raised her tearful eyes slowly in disbelief as we reluctantly informed her of the remains of her daughter buried in a disused house deep in the bush 10km away from her home. Our finding was not only gruesome but rather disappointing. A terrible creature known to the slain little girl as grandfather had been out roaming the savanna of Majakaneng, ruling the household with disguised pride and pretending to be striking fear into the hearts of every threatening criminal baying for the family's blood!

Yet, the criminal in him tried in vain to let us on a marry-go-round to cover his trails and evil deeds! Still disguised, he led the Police Investigative Unit that had descended on Majakaneng to a new search for the grandmother. And again, our police came up tops and cracked the case leading to a chase up to an Mpumalanga village were the beast was tamed and arrested.

Madam Speaker, apart from the fear of our criminal brothers, sisters, fathers and least mothers, our deepest fear is the racism we met at Skierlik Informal Settlement in Swartruggens meted out by an 18 year old Johan Nel. A white boy with all the requisite danger, and wildness against an unarmed and unsuspecting poor black people.

His cowardly attack leaving five black people dead and scores injured derives its nourishment from the existence of anti-black attitude largely denied by the opposition. It is not surprising therefore that after generations of racism in our country; some elements within the white community would like to preserve racism practice of white supremacy.

How can we forget the horrifying murder early this year of sixty year old lady Zaiboon Jeena of Ottoshoop? Her gruesome murder sent shocking waves across the province. She was burned with a hot iron, raped, stabbed and had her fingers broken, ostensibly for the sake of R20,00. Suspects were arrested within days and unfortunately, one of them managed to escape with another convict from police custody and committed two more gruesome murders within old Zaiboon Jeena's neighbourhood. Mr Thia Deysel and his loving wife Katrina were slaughtered by the beast of Ottoshoop.

Madam Speaker, I list these few but striking crimes which demonstrate the violent and barbaric nature of crimes in our province! Crime erodes the very fabric of our society! Its sole purpose is to instil fear in the hearts and minds of peace loving South Africans diminishing the confidence the world has in our country and Africa! Our motherland has drawn the enemy out the scourge of crime in all its forms; exposed it for what it is and shamed it in front of all of us!

We have a battle to fight, and the battle requires all of us. With all of us involved, criminals will know that our crime fighting machinery is powerful, dangerous and to be reckoned with! Those who choose to stand by the wayside must only be those in the service of crime itself, bloodthirsty criminals fiercely devoted to undermine peace of our communities. Unbelievable indeed, even when we know we are at war against criminals, we still find people who refuse to act against it!

We live in dangerous denial, a denial that not only endangers our lives but countless defenceless others such as our women folk; our children, the elderly and people with disability! We have reached the cutting edge to charge forward against a crime sprawling around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Our strength against the roaring lion is revealed by one of us standing against it and even increased by our communities swelling the ranks of our policing forums. We must shift the battle against crime to new and higher levels.

'It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer could have done better.'

In her State of the Province Address, the Premier indicated that crime remained a challenge we all face and must collectively solve. She referred to societal problems of theft, armed robbery, abuse of children and women, fraud and corruption that continue to plaque our communities. She also referred to the 2007/08 National Crime Report that revealed that the North West province improved its fight against crime, albeit minimal. The national target for the reduction of crime as part of 'The Fight against Crime Campaign' registered a reduction of 6,9% last year as opposed to the target of seven percent.

The Premier pointed out, though, that whilst our performance shows improvement, the incidents such as the ones I have referred to earlier tell us that we must still strive to increase our fight and create safer neighbourhoods. This year, innovated measures are being introduced to yield greater community participation.

We will also recruit additional SAPS and traffic members, improve resource allocation and prudent use thereof and enhance coordination within the Justice Cluster in the province. We will continue to monitor the performance of the police in the province with the aim of ensuring that they render the service as expected but strive to improve.

In one such assessment, that we commissioned in the past year, we sought the public perception of police performance at our police stations. Generally, the survey revealed that service delivery at our police stations fluctuated between negative and positive. The survey showed that there were still deeply rooted negative perceptions towards the SAPS. However, people showed satisfaction at the services they received at these police stations, an indication the police are really trying to live by the people's expectations.

Madam Speaker, I have also taken liberty to undertake unannounced visits to at least 30 police stations in the peeing hours of the morning when our country is asleep and criminals pounce on our homestead in the comfort of our rest.

I have noted the good, the bad and the ugly parts of our safety keeping capability as a police service. I found best practice in some and worst practice in our police stations. In the main, poor management accounts for our weaknesses and good accounts for our strength. We must applaud the "A" lady Captain in Hartebeespoortdam police station for prudent management and condemn the Inspector at Zeerust police station for poor management.

I was also impressed with an extremely confident student police officer whose enthusiasm permeates six police reservists on duty in the exceptional piece of work they do in guaranteeing safety of the Tlhabane precincts. We need men and women of this stature! Crime will shake in its pants if met with these youth, mean men and women in blue!

The credit belongs to the man in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly who knows the great enthusiasm; the great devotions, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at best knows in the end the triumph of high achievements, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring gently, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who have never known neither victory nor defeat!' I take my hat off for these noble men and women in blue!

I must hasten to say, though, that we still need to deal with public perceptions in certain areas such as co-ordination of crime prevention in the province with special focus on piloting and marketing crime prevention strategies through environmental design for the province. In this regard, we have already spent R250 000 to successfully develop and implement a local crime prevention strategy through environmental design for the Kanana Township in the Matlosana Local Municipality. The strategy has yielded positive results with the successful profiling, investigation and arrest of 96 members of 24 criminal gangs. This has led to greater stability and safety in the area, improved and immobilising the gang's reign of terror.

This has also yielded improved partnership that involved the police, the Kanana Community Police Forum, sector crime forums, the religious fraternity and other role players. We have already presented this strategy to four other municipalities, but lack of resources hampered our implementation.

This actually illustrates our general challenge in ensuring that all municipalities take crime prevention seriously and budget for it. We say this, because municipalities also have the responsibility to actively participate in the social crime prevention initiatives and work with the police in setting joint priorities and identifying possible areas for local government intervention and effective enforcement of by-laws.

This Strategy, if implemented by all the municipalities, will ensure elimination of opportunities for criminals in our respective municipalities. On another front of crime that our province experiences, is the abuse of women and children. Our society at large has made up its mind about women and child abuse.

We've together gazed into the future, searched the pages of many literatures on the subject, listened carefully to many victims' voices silent and loud but without a great battle in which man can live and die for society; surely we would fail to free our women folk and the child she bears from abuse! I hope you are getting the picture by now! We need to stand up and fight to keep abuse away!

'It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer could have done better'

Our annual 16 Days of Activism Campaign against Abuse of Women and Children has given us an incredible result. We stand on the threshold to challenge our male folk to change! I've noticed that so often our words to boys and men are misguided, least misleading and inappropriate. We boldly must pronounce and bestow the right qualities of a new man! I listened to a group of ladies enjoying a drink at a pub and captured these worrying words: "you wouldn't know it from what walks in a pair of trousers is in the image of the Lion of Judah or the beast of Pheela!"

My deepest fear was out! I watched as some men fitted the Lion of Judah no lonely women, no fatherless child, no hunger, no homelessness, striking fear into the hearts of the enemy, bringing down the tyrants and ruling democratically with an abundance of love! Equally, I felt some men exposed, found wanting, discovered as an impostor and not really a man! These are men who rape our children, who when looking at their hearts don't find the good in them but instead anger, lust and fear! These are men who feel less like the real man in the presence of others! They without provocation are driven to the darker regions of their souls and unleash violence unparallel!

A man bears the image of God in his strength, not so much physically but soulfully! If we bring up our boys to be this man, abuse of our women and children will be defeated. 2008/09 Heralds our forward march to convert men!

In our last campaign, a satellite march against gender violence was held in Maboloka in the Madibeng Local Municipality to coincide with the national Million Men's March held in Bloemfontein on 25th November 2007 began this journey of converting men! The involvement of men as key partners in the fight against gender violence was a breakthrough for the campaign because for the first time violence against men was acknowledged; and men committed themselves to be protectors of their families through a ten point pledge. About 4 000 people participated in the launch. Members of this House will also remember that the Provincial Executive Council resolved last year that we should develop the Sexual Offences Strategy in order to curb the sexual offences through the involvement of other criminal justice cluster departments and NGOs involved in crime prevention. We have since developed this strategy at a tune of R500 000.

Madam Speaker, the battle to fight the enemy would be meaningless and weak if we exclude our communities! Allow me to paraphrase our 'battle to fight' with the following poem by Thomas A Kempis:
'If we would endeavour, like men of courage, to stand in the battle,
Surely we would feel the favourable assistance of God from Heaven.
For he who giveth us the occasion to fight, to the end we may get the victory,
is ready to succor those that fight manfully, and do trust in his grace.'

In this regard, the involvement of the community through community policing forums, community safety forums, police reservists, ordinary community members and identifiable police force multiplier within our communities, is extremely crucial. We must find as we form and populate these structures of our policing capability warriors within our communities as we engage in the 'battle to fight crime!'

The quality of true warriors is those devoted in the service to a purpose greater than them! Fighting crime has become that greater purpose. Whilst on the subject of force multiplier, an urgent meeting with all operating security companies within the province will be convened in 60 days from today to enrol in the official overall crime fighting machinery!

Furthermore, we need to exploit the force multiplier approach in the form of both private and public security agencies harnessing the overhaul of community policing forums to newly approved community safety forums as directed by the Honourable Minister of Safety and Security, Mr Charles Nqakula.

The envisaged Community Safety Forums must be relocated to local municipalities and be resourced accordingly. To date we have presented this directive to all municipalities and our plan now is to work jointly with the South African Police Services (SAPS) and the municipalities in speeding up the overhaul. We have set aside R662 000 for this exercise.

Road Safety Promotion and Traffic Management

The House will remember that we undertook to hold the Road Safety Lekgotla during the 2007/08 Financial Year. Our plan is to host it on the 26 June 2008 and develop a provincial Road Safety Strategy which will assist to do road safety promotion and education better. Key to this will be our efforts to reduce accident fatalities, especially pedestrian fatalities while the law enforcement will deal with the driver behaviour. We have had to postpone this conference due to unforeseen and unavoidable circumstances.

During October Transport Month, we decided to launch an operation called Jaws for Life. As a result thereof 45 high speed vehicles were procured to maximise visibility and inculcate a new culture of law abidance. Now let me stop for a moment to make something clear, 'Gabolas Jaws' is wild at heart! It is a unit that embodies stability and safety on our roads. It catches and breaks the law breaking motorists! It fights the grizzly non-payment of outstanding traffic fines with vigour and wins the battle of road discipline. I've yet to meet a motorist who wants to mess with our great sea hunter Jaws!

Jaws have tamed our roads recording a high positive driver behaviour and high revenue collection through execution of outstanding warrants. Many drivers voluntarily paid their outstanding traffic fines and those who were stubborn felt the might of the Jaws grip.

We have to date arrested, from October last year, 4 645 drivers for unpaid fines, discontinued 164 taxis from operating due to manipulated extended seating capacity, impounded 388 taxis and confiscated approximately 1 200 wrongly printed number plates. A total amount of R3 099 350 was collected from 2 16 warrants executed. For wrong doers, submit or fight but be guaranteed if you choose to fight -Jaws will emerge the victor!

During the 2007/08 Financial Year several drivers' licenses were cancelled. Although in the public perception these are cancelled due to dishonesty or even corruption, it should be noted that actually the majority was cancelled due to administrative malpractices such as testing stations not meeting certain requirements and tests not complying with the standards set in terms of the legislative framework.

The department has allowed for an appeal system, whereby each case is judged on its merit and if justifiable the department will allow a re-test. We are also investigating the possibility of implementing a computerised system of issuing driver licenses in the province, which will make the process more transparent, simple, fast and cheaper. The system should be able to eliminate most of the problems we currently encounter.

Once again we discovered tendencies leading to violent confrontation in the Rustenburg area. Pre-emptively, we launched another Special Public Transport Enforcement Taxi Operation to deal with the taxi violence threat. The area was declared with Emergency Regulations and associated areas/districts followed.

These measures impose strict guidelines enabling our law enforcement agencies to intervene with firm and heavy measures. A Joint Police and Traffic Task Team led by Captain Mampuru recorded huge successes leading to the discovery of fraudulent taxi operating license scams in Rustenburg and circulated in the North West and Gauteng provinces.

Individual taxi operators, an advocate and a civil servant are on trial for various crimes in this regard. About 800 taxis were impounded for operating without a valid operating license and some paid a fine of between R3 000 to R5 000. 38 taxis were taken off the road and 900 summonses to the value of R3 050 000 issued for permits and operating contrary to the terms of the operating license. 65 arrests were made for various offences ranging from intimidation, unlawful possession of firearms and drugs and operating taxis illegally.

'It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer could have done better'.

Our road network is threatened by overloading of trucks. A new weighbridge is being built at Bapong on the N4 near Brits. It will cater for traffic on both the N4 between Rustenburg and Brits as well as the Old Rustenburg–Pretoria road, the R103. Construction is set to be completed in July 2008 with the launch being planned for August 2008. The weighbridge will conduct a 24 hour service focusing on overloading control.

We will fill 72 new posts in order to support the operation of the weighbridge. As from the 2008/09 Financial Year, the Potchefstroom weighbridge will also be upgraded to provide 24 hour service. The upgrading of the Ventersdorp and Wolmaransstad Weighbridges started in 2007 and are set to be completed during the 1st quarter of the 2008/09 financial year.

Our Arrive Alive plans have yielded positive results both during the Festive and Easter Seasons. While there were challenges during the festive season with regard to the high number of pedestrian fatalities, we managed to increase high visibility which deterred many road users from misbehaving on our roads. A high level of visibility throughout the Easter also resulted in a decrease of 9.52% in the number of road users killed during the Easter weekend compared to Easter 2007.

We are working hard to ensure that our traffic officers receive the necessary support in order to meet the required standard set for them. This will include empowering women within traffic and providing the necessary training to them also in preparation of the 2010 FIFA Soccer World Cup. We will sort out communication problems, quicker vehicle replacement and an allocation policy, proper management and control of the traffic resource and last but not least, enlist new recruits to capacitate the current force.

Roads Infrastructure

Madam Speaker, my predecessor MEC Jerry Dimotana Thibedi characterised the challenge to build and maintain our road network so aptly that a repetition would only seek to underscore the point. A prime cause of the current schism has been to over decades under fund the roads budget not out of neglect but rather difficult choices we made against competing needs. What is perhaps the hardest part of this challenge, has been to apply the little resources allocated to us against a fast deteriorating network coupled with new needs arising from old and new settlement expansion.

Needless to say, the roads story doesn't go well. We are challenged to turn around this bad story into a good one! In this regard, we undertook an audit of all provincial roads in order to create a Road Infrastructure Asset Register. A High Speed Digital Audit recording all roadside assets such as signs, lanes, markings as well as the conditional state of these assets was done through a leading edge technology data capturing pioneered locally over 17 years.

In short, the technology provides a three dimensional virtual world with the position of the asset as well as digital proof of each asset. The above audit takes us a step further from the thorough going assessment of both our internal capacity to deliver and the external environment in which we operate, we undertook earlier.

The assessment shows that after the abolishment of cross-boundary municipalities, the provincial road network comprises 20 689km in total, of which 14 191 kilometers is gravel road and 6 398km is surfaced. 36% of surfaced roads is in poor to very poor condition and that 70% gravel roads are in poor to very poor condition. The common factor on our roads is the deterioration rate scoring higher than our maintenance programme.

Without properly funded routine maintenance, emergency repairs and capitalisation programmes we stand to face a much greater and difficult future! The future has begun catching up with us evident with the prolific pothole challenge and major road surface failures!

In monetary terms, the department has a backlog maintenance of R6 billion and requiring an average investment of R1,2 billion annually for an unbroken period of five years to clear the backlog maintenance. This figure does not include routine maintenance estimated at about R300 million per annum to manage routine maintenance.

In addition, our strategy to improve the condition of our rural communities and mobility thereof, an additional R700 million per annum for an unbroken five years is required to upgrade our gravel network to surfaced roads. We therefore require a total investment of R11.0 billion over the next five years to bring our road network to good condition. This is a far cry from the R578 million allocated for road maintenance and constructing new roads for the 2008/09 financial year. Our internal capacity assessment also revealed a shocking poor capability due to various factors now placed under serious intervention.

These range from proper management, a simplified business processing system and appropriate plant to get the job of road maintenance and construction done. Allow me to use two examples to paraphrase our findings. We have been hugely criticised for lack of timeous pothole repair and our findings in this regard are revealing. At a meeting I attended with all cluster heads (municipal based) of our road management teams from across the province, followed by an intense assessment of our capacity, we discovered that we were seriously lacking in road repair unit personnel, appropriate equipment for rapid response and material supply.

'It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer could have done better'

This is compounded by poor communication, general discipline and supervision. Our personnel recruitment on these teams was last done in 1998 through a conversion of temporary grass and road reserve landscapers to maintenance teams.
We started with 15 members per team and now stand at less than seven active team members. On the other hand, contracted external companies have a free hand due to lack of adequate monitoring and administration of penalties when they stray from agreed terms. This picture should not suggest a collapse of our responsibility but rather a critical self appraisal and intention to correct these wrongs. We have registered good successes in many other areas such as our multiyear new roads construction programme popularly known as the Capex Program.

We have been able to register 98% expenditure of our allocated road maintenance and construction budget totalling R542 325 million. We managed to upgrade 90km of gravel roads into surfaced condition. We also rehabilitated 33km of badly affected surfaced roads and resealed 31km of our road network. These figures are far less than the achievements of the previous year due to rising costs of construction and the fewer projects implemented in line with the budget available resulting from fast growing inflation. All of us are alive to the ever increasing fuel price with huge implication on roads maintenance and construction activity!

Unavoidably, the cost to construct 1km of surfaced road has tripled compared to figures applicable in 2005 and this year we expect even higher tariffs. However, the call to duty is upon us! We can't bury our heads in the sand and think the problem will disappear. We must all enjoin a new breeze of innovating our systems of delivery and create efficiencies. In respect of a new effective pothole repair innovation, we have decided to form 21 Rapid Deployment Pothole Repair Teams based in every municipality responsible for provincial roads. These teams are capacitated with new easy to use equipment with a shorter turnaround time for pothole repair.

We have handpicked and selected able members within the department and constituted the new units. We are currently exposing them to onsite training and are to begin with active deployment with effect from the 1st June 2008. We are spending a total budget on equipping these teams of approximately R30 million. We have taken first delivery of the Rapid Deployment Pothole Repair Truck fully equipped for work on display outside. Nine more trucks will be received within the next six weeks and all additional equipments required!

The department has created 3 718 job opportunities through road construction and maintenance programmes, of which 88% were created through the EPWP.

As the Premier pointed out in her State of the Province Address in February 2008, we needed to come up with a strategy of mobilising more resources to augment the budget shortfall. In this regard, innovated measures with financial institutions are at an advance stage to realise this goal. We have carefully considered various options followed by a number of sister provinces and newly found solutions outside government.

We are also pursuing the national government on a special case basis to come to the rescue of the North West challenge. In the same breath, we have found sound ways to prudently apply the allocated budget and make the necessary improvements on our road network, albeit small.

Our problems were further compounded by heavy rainfall experienced late last year to the earlier part of 2008 resulting in huge delays and increased standing time. We are not singing 'rain rain go away, come again another day' but rather would look at the positive side of rain for farmers, water scarce areas of Lefurutshe and many other essentials of water. We have seen some roads and bridges in Bosplaas being totally submerged whilst under construction.

Even the generally dry areas of Tosca in Bophirima have not been spared either, with heavy downpours experienced on prolonged periods so much that the contractors had no options but to let the traffic ride on uncompleted road resulting in damages to the road pavement. These roads had to be repaired before further work could commence.

Mafikeng has been given a new facelift befitting a status of a capital city. The upgrading of the Nelson Mandela Drive to Ramatlabama border post almost complete with finishing touches underway. I am pleased to report that the road will be officially opened within the next fourteen days from today. Most of our road projects if not all have proceeded well although some delays have been experienced due to the unfavourable weather conditions in some of the projects.

However, a farmer in his sixties, a real Koster gentleman with a pinstripe suit and an elegant manner of speech pulled me aside during a church service in Rustenburg. Quietly, almost apologetically, he spoke of his love for the North West, for the open fields and peace loving citizens! How eventually he and a buddy retiring from the platinum mines build farms around the Koster/Rustenburg road many years back. He spoke to me in the purest form of Setswana which he claims to have suck from his mother's breast. Then came a stare in his eyes I will never forget. He quipped: 'Why is our government wasteful? Why are we letting a contractor on the Koster/Rustenburg play games with our money?'

I, in response acknowledged the challenge we face in this particular project. I know I almost wanted to apologise but rather chose to explain our dilemma.

Fresh from meeting the Consultants, Contractor, Senior Departmental management and our Capex managers under one roof barely a week earlier, I was armed with the necessary factual response of a project gone wrong! This project suffered an assortment of problems from conception, right through implementation and failed completion. Everybody associated with the project in my view carries a fair amount of blame except the consultant who now carries a much bigger chunk of our problems!

To cut a long story short, the department has had to employ new consultants to take the project forward and beefed-up the emerging contractor's managerial capacity. Since this intervention late last year, considerable progress has been registered to date. My farmer friend acknowledged the new upbeat and pressed for the recovery of our lost investment. I cannot agree more with him and I must confess that we are hot on the heels of the consultants' insurance without ruling out other responsible agents. The road is now scheduled for completion in the next three months.

Our priority road for the coming year, 2008/09 is the second phase of the Phokeng/Sun City road earmarked to contribute positively to the 2010 FIFA World Cup Soccer Tournament and the general promotion of access to our tourism destination. The first phase from Phokeng/Boshoek is complete and open to traffic use. The last two phases will be completed in 2009/10. Whilst on the subject of 2010 FIFA World Cup Soccer Tournament, we have identified and ousted both legacy and dire road network needs for a smooth facilitation of an incident free tournament. To achieve this noble intent, a budget of R600 million is required to construct and or improve this road network.

We have established a 2010 Joint Transportation Technical Task Team for the facilitation of this project comprising our department, the Rustenburg Local Municipality, the Bafokeng Tribal Council, the Mining Houses and the other transport business based companies in and around Rustenburg. Despite the budget challenges we face, we have placed great importance on the development and maintenance of the road network in and around Rustenburg to bring them up to scratch.

Transportation

Madam Speaker, our responsibility to ensure the Integrated Transport Planning and Land Use System as prescribed by the NLTTAA 26 of 2006 requires of us to change the face of public transportation in the North West.

In this regard, the department started a process of developing a Provincial Land Transport Framework (PLTF). A consultative workshop was held in Buffelspoort Resort during the past financial year (i.e. February 2007) that developed strategies aiming at improving transport systems around the province. To mention, but a few milestones, the following draft strategies were developed at the consultative conference:

* The Public Transport Strategy
* The Infrastructure Strategy
* The Funding Strategy.

These strategies will finally be adopted by the end of this financial year.

The workshop went further to launch the North West Freight Data Bank. This Data Bank can now be accessed on the departmental website and it reflects the current freight statistics, information on freight movement and origins/destination of these cargos. It is aimed at making lives easier for our stakeholders and allowing proper planning by my department. Furthermore, the workshop agreed that the Transport Co-ordinating Structures (TCS) should be established.

Madam Speaker, I am pleased to announce that by end of business today, I will officially inaugurate the Transport Co-ordinating Structure of the province. All of us are alive to the rural nature of our province and challenges thereto. To this end my department has embarked on an exercise of developing the Rural Transport Strategy. The primary objective of this study is to compile a comprehensive Rural Transport Plan for the North West province, in order to address mobility challenges faced by the rural poor, to the equalities in the living standards and access to basic services between rural and urban areas and to encourage investments in indigenous transport technological solutions.

Madam Speaker, Winston Churchill once said "there is no better investment than putting milk in the babies" we fully concur. In the State of the Province address, the Premier mentioned that "Our Province has opted to invest in transporting 11 751 farm learners to school on a daily basis.

This project started with a pilot in the Lichtenburg/Coligny area with some 5 397 learners transported on a daily basis. We want to extend this programme to other areas in the province." In this regard my department is developing a comprehensive Scholar Transport Plan, which will be completed before the end of this financial year, to ensure the expansion of this service.

Overall, the province spends per annum an amount of R350 million to subsidise an additional 57 000 worker commuters and 18 000 scholar commuters daily.

On the taxi transformation agenda, Taxi Recapitalisation remains a thrust in the transformation of the Taxi Industry. Our province has made great strides in implementing this programme. To date, we can confirm that we have received 13 572 applications for conversion to operating licenses and we have already approved 10 211 of them and issued 8 112. We have already scrapped 2 392 old taxis as part of the scrapping process to the value of R119.9 million and 25 are standing at our pound waiting to be scrapped.

The Taxi Business Roll-Out Project: Kopanong Shopping Centre: Ngaka Modiri-Molema District Transport Co-operative has seen the development of 16 000 square metres of shopping and service industry spaces on the empty site adjacent to the Crossing Mall in Mafikeng and is proceeding under a company called Kopanong Shopping Complex (Pty) Ltd. Final plans for this R130 million project have been submitted to the Municipality and construction will commence immediately upon approval of electricity supply to the site by Eskom.

The latter has put an embargo on consideration of any new developments until 31 May 2008. The Ngaka Modiri-Molema District Transport Cooperative has 50% equity in Kopanong, which was facilitated by the R5 million grants from government as well as an ABSA loan for the development of this Centre. The anchor tenant is Shoprite Checkers and its sister brands. It also includes services supporting taxi operators as well as facilities for a cinema group.

This is the first shopping centre fully integrated with a taxi rank in South Africa and the official opening is targeted for July 2009. Four similar developments are being planned in the rest of the North West province.

Electronic Management System

The Taxi Industry has entered into a strategic partnership on the implementation of an Electronic Fare Collection System for the province. This system has reached an advanced stage of development together with First National Bank (FNB) to comply with the national Department of Transport requirements still to be published, inclusive of a contact-free Smart Card Payment System, backed up by a Bank, for all readers inside the vehicles able to read – Bank, Europay, MasterCard and Visa issued cards in order to ensure interoperability between the different modes of transport (taxis, buses and trains).

Strategic partners to this multi million rand deal which include Digicor, Tripswitch, nVisionIT and FNB. The full system architecture has been developed and the project will be rolled out on a pilot basis during August 2008 making the North West the first province to roll out EMS at provincial level.

We have recently appointed the North West Operating Licensing Board. It is my conviction that this appointment will assist in speeding up the Taxi Recap Process and other related processes. May we also confirm the continuous commitment of support from my department regarding the Commercial Centres, Training and Administrative support?

We are proud to announce, Madam Speaker, that the Cabinet has recently approved the transfer of the License for the International Status from Pilanesburg to the Mafikeng Airport as per our request. In this regard, the department started a process of evolving a strategy to implement the International Status at the Mafikeng Airport. This strategy amongst other things will have to address the following:

* The future management of the Airport
* The infrastructure development of the Airport in order to comply with International Status
* Compliance with the Civil Aviation Authority
* This will also give impetus fast-tracking of the Mafikeng Industrial Development Zone project

With regard to the status of the privatisation process of Northwest Star, it is imperative to note that in the late 1980s the company experienced a high growth rate, up to 20% per annum and was acknowledged as a leader in the bus industry. However, the company fell prey to ever-increasing financial difficulties which were aggravated by poor service quality, continuous passenger losses and insufficient subsidy funding compared to other operators. Preventative maintenance and bus replacements and refurbishing were stopped in 1995 and 1996 due to the prevailing cash position. By the end of 1998 company debt had escalated to levels where the cash flow generated by operations could no longer maintain creditor payments.

This resulted in sporadic stoppages in the supply of key components, further aggravating the already poor service delivery to passengers. The company was technically bankrupt and prompted the North West Provincial Government to have the company placed under Judicial Management in March 1999 to freeze company debt and effect the turn-around of the company rather than allow a wasteful liquidation to the detriment of the North West Government as majority shareholder.

The appointment of an experienced Executive Management team, the fourth since 1996, and the Judicial Managers heralded the commencement of the turn-around process. This proved successful and profits were recorded as from the 2003 financial year. The successful turn-around of the company re-established its attractiveness to the market and allowed the NWPG and the Joint Judicial Management to embark on a re-deployment process to sell the various operations to private operators.

The process would be completed in two phases

Phase one comprised the sale of the western services of the Northwest Star which included the services of Thari Transport, Tlhabane Bus Service and the far western depots of Lehurutshe, Bophirima and Mmabatho. This made up almost 50% of the company. More than 30 consortia, companies and other alliances declared their interest to purchase and after analysis, 10 Organisations were short listed and allowed to submit final bids. The take-over date for the far western operations by Atamelang Bus Transport as well as the Thari operations by Amarosa was set for 1 September 2004.

The transfers were successfully affected on that date. The first phase of the privatisation process was completed at the end of September 2004 with the handing over of the Tlhabane operating unit in Bojanala Bus Service.

Phase two of the redeployment differs from the list from the first phase in respect of the fact that the Gauteng Department of Transport, Roads and Public Works (Gautrans) will be the employer for the negotiated contract, also providing the required funding from its budget. The NWPG remains the owner of the company in which the assets and business are to be sold and thus the beneficiary of any excess funds generated by the sale.

MEC Jacobs and I have met on the process matters of Phase two and we have agreed to a Technical Task Team consisting of officials from both provinces. The ask team had to provide us with options to be discussed with the Minister of Transport. In due course we will meet with the Minister in order to pave the way forward.

Corporate Support for 2008/09

The department reviewed its organisational structure so as to align it with the core business and its mandatory obligations. This structure makes provision for a total of 5 037 posts. Due to budgetary constraints all these posts can however, not be funded. The total number of posts filled and funded within 2007/08 were 2 905; 225 were vacant and 110 were vacant and unfunded.

Madame Speaker, due to the moratorium placed on the filling of vacancies and the constraints in terms of the budget, the department has identified 166 posts to be filled throughout the department so as to ensure that service delivery is not compromised. The department's plight has been communicated with the office of the Premier to ensure compliance yet not compromising service delivery.

Performance recognition and reward for outstanding performance is very vital in view of feedback to employees on their contribution towards the objectives of the department.

Madame Speaker, the department has managed to address a huge backlog in terms of personnel performance assessments which have been outstanding due to the previous mergers of the department that affected employees adversely. During the 2007/08 financial year, 2104 Performance Management and Development System (PMDS) cases were moderated.

The department continues to pride itself in terms of affording employees equitable access to training so as to realise a representative, skilled public service. 1 068 employees underwent re-orientation and induction training and 303 employees completed the Adult Based Education Training (ABET) Literature project. 13 learners completed the Road Safety Skills Programme and 19 learners have been appointed on the Law Enforcement Learnerships Programme.

Madame Speaker, the department successfully organised the departmental candle light and organised inter departmental candle light events and participated in the consultative HIV and AIDS workshops on the National strategic plan for 2007/11. HIV and Aids awareness campaigns were held in all four districts and the department assisted with the CANSA awareness campaign. 46 HIV and Aids peer educators have been screened and launched.

The Special Programmes Unit facilitated the Departmental Gender Mainstreaming Dialogues for Districts and Head Office personnel, of which dialogues were officiated by one of the South African Women liberation stalwarts, Rev Motlalepula Chabaku and South African Men against Gender Discrimination, Mr Jabu wa Afrika. In the same breath, Joint Road Camps' awareness campaigns were undertaken with the Department of Justice to enlighten road workers about the Maintenance and Family Violence Acts during the 16 Days of Activism. (These are critical as the road-camps sometimes become a haven for social, moral decay – similar disadvantages realized as those of migrant labourers).

Whereas the department had made remarkable progress with regard to employment equity over the past three years, we recently realized an exodus of Women Senior Managers, thus creating incongruence in terms of employment equity which calls for a concerted effort to fill these posts with equally competent and skilled women so as to address the skew employment equity statistics. Women managers are highly in demand and thus we recently lost our cream of the crop to other organisations.

The department however, Madame Speaker, remains committed to Women Empowerment and will make a conscious effort to appoint women in its top structures on their merits and not as a matter of tokenism or for compliance only. In order to enrich collaboration of corporate support financial management will be strengthened. Corporate Service and Financial management will continue to direct its services to a strategic and integrated approach with regard to human resource planning which incorporates employment equity, affirmative action and human resource development.

With regard to human resource development, the department will aim to provide Internship/Learnership Programmes for the unemployed youth as set by the National Cabinet, to address scarce skills in Roads Engineering, Infrastructure Development and Civil Engineering related fields.

Finance and Revenue Collection

The financial management in the department is showing an improvement on year by year. Over the past two financial years the department has been spending between 98 to 100% of its allocated funds and has not requested for roll over, especially for capital and infrastructure spending. Surely, the department is well positioned to effectively and efficiently spend its required direction for transportation and roads infrastructure; unfortunately it has over the years been allocated less than 50% of its required allocation.

The department is committed to making payment to its service providers within the prescribed period of 30 days especially to emerging companies. Presently, up to 95% of all payments to service providers are within the 30 days scheduled time. The 5% delays are caused mainly by mistakes and omissions on the invoices submitted by service providers, forcing us to send them back for correction, thus causing some delays.

The Department of Transport, Roads and Community Safety is responsible for the collection and accounting of over 65% of provincial own revenue. For the year under review, the department exceeded its revenue budget by 12% or R38.578. This was as a direct result of capacity building in the department and closer collaboration with the Provincial Treasury.

As per table below, the total budget for the financial year 2008/09 is R1.6 billion including conditional grants of R451 million.

Programmes (R`000)
Administration: R114.447
Roads Infrastructure: R714.602
Public Transport: R533.496
Traffic Management: R211.570
Community Based Programme: R43 000
Monitoring and Oversight: R44.262

Total
1: R661.377

Conclusion

As I conclude, we offer this policy speech not as the ultimate steps to achieving our set goal but rather an account of our performance for the year passed and a plan for the year ahead! We do so as a Safari of the transport heart to recover its course to better serve! It must ignite our passion to better service and adventure us to find better solutions for the challenge we all face.

My deep thanks go to those who have helped me climb a mountain as high and challenging as life itself! The Premier Edna Molewa for her stewardess, my colleagues in EXCO for sharpening my wits, the Portfolio Committee and Legislature members for not sparing my rot, the HoD Nic Van Staden for your professional advice and last but not least my private office and entire support staff! I am proud to serve with you in a rare opportunity to our province.

Today marks my 14 policy speech which is an honour many wish to have and I feel privileged at the deployment of the ANC and the hospitality of the North West Community for which I'm thankful.

To my family, Shirley - my wife, our flowers Keabetswe (succumbed to Meningitis in 2006), Botlile (succumbed to Lupus in 2008), Leago, Ipeleng (our adopted son) Mzwakhe and Bokamoso, I thank you for your patience, grace and support!

Thank you for keeping me battle ready!

I want to pay special thanks to all of you who keep my family in their prayers every time. It gives us the energy to rise another day and face a world full of opportunities. Thanks for your support as we buried our second daughter Botlile Pearl Vilakazi on 3 May 2008.

I thank you!

Issued by: Department of Roads and Transport, North West Provincial Government
27 June 2008
Source: North West Provincial Government (http://www.nwpg.gov.za/)