Curries Fountain, Durban: 14 February 2009

Today I have the privilege of unveiling the Inkatha Freedom Party's 2009 KwaZulu Natal Manifesto. It is a specially tailored version of our national manifesto for the specific challenges and needs of the province of KwaZulu Natal. Like our national manifesto, it is built on years of experience in the government of KwaZulu Natal and on our solid understanding of the challenges the province faces today. In many ways, it is also the outcome of our Listening Campaign with which our public representatives criss-crossed KwaZulu Natal last year.

Let me make one thing absolutely clear. We are not here today to play the politics of promises. We are here to commit ourselves to a coherent and workable plan of action as the next government of KwaZulu Natal. I passionately believe that with the right plan of action and a best team to implement it, KwaZulu Natal can become South Africa's most prosperous province - for which it has tremendous - and in many ways untapped - potential.

I recognise that there has been some achievement in KwaZulu Natal over the past five years when my party has been in opposition. It would be dishonest of me not to acknowledge this. But if we are honest with each other, we should accept that the province has gone backwards in far too many areas. The manifesto I am presenting to you today identifies the key areas of governance in KwaZulu Natal where redress and progress are needed urgently, namely education, health, economic development, housing, agriculture and transport. Ours are real solutions to real problems. While implementing them, we are also determined to promote social solidarity and fight corruption.    

For me personally, politics is a vehicle by which one can contribute towards the wellbeing of society. I am driven by a need to serve. It is why I became an educator and later a municipal councillor and mayor. This was also my real motivation when I accepted my party’s nomination to become Premier of KwaZulu Natal should the IFP win the election. I did my best to infuse my party’s manifesto with this deeply-felt desire to serve.  

All my life I have been acutely aware of the nature of the society in which I have lived: of the glaring disparities dividing communities; of deep and enduring poverty, especially in rural areas; of children whose potential for advancement was not served by the schools they attended; of abuse of women and children; of disease not treated. I am committed to driving government to address all the issues identified in this manifesto so that your life is made better. In doing so, I will consult widely and engage with stakeholders, interest groups and communities so that we do things together. Civil society must feel part and parcel of the new government, partners in identifying and solving the many challenges before us. 

Speaking to you as a woman, mother and former teacher, I am not prepared to accept that schools should be war zones, that educators and learners lack discipline, that schools have no laboratories and no sports fields, that textbooks are delivered months late, and that education fails to prepare our children for the real world – our economy. Similarly, I am not prepared to accept that there can be hospitals without doctors, that patients should wait long for treatment or have their operations indefinitely postponed, that medicines are lacking, that people with treatable diseases, and especially HIV and Aids, are inadequately looked after.

As a law-abiding citizen, I am not prepared to accept that it is normal for crime to ravage our communities. Rich or poor – you have a horrifyingly high chance of falling victim to violent crime. Can our communities not do more, working with government, to stop this? As a civil servant who has consistently run a tight ship free of corruption, I am not prepared to accept that government should be guilty of gross mismanagement, corruption, nepotism and the like and that government funds are blatantly used for party purposes. If government is not clean, then what hope do we have? I believe government must set the example. 

An IFP government under my leadership will do just that. We will establish mechanisms to make government more transparent, more accountable and more inclusive than it is at present. At present there is too much secrecy, withheld information, protection of failure, appointment of incompetents, and a general malaise negating the proper professionalism of our public service. To borrow a phrase from another country and another time: we want a government of the people, by the people and for the people. The IFP government will not be a branch of my party unlike the status quo under the ANC, but it will be genuinely committed to serving every person in this province irrespective of race, wealth, political affiliation, place of residence or anything else. 

Let me give you a brief overview of what my government can do for you. Education, as you know, is in a state of revolving crisis. Basic literacy, numeracy and writing skills have been neglected in pursuit of the nebulous objectives of Outcomes-Based Education. The province lacks properly qualified and motivated teachers. The shortage of teachers in mathematics, science and the technical subjects has not been addressed. Resources are uneven and erratically distributed. Certain schools have become dens of drug abuse, violence, teenage pregnancy, immorality and violence. In many schools governing bodies play no meaningful role. The unchecked HIV and Aids pandemic is wreaking havoc in the education system.  

A measure of the decline in the quality of education in KwaZulu Natal since the IFP has been out of office has been the drop in the matriculation pass rate from 77.2% in the last year of the IFP’s term to 57.8% in 2009. The challenge is therefore the building of a school system that preserves and enhances the pockets of excellence that exist, at the same time lifting the historically disadvantaged schools to the same standards through a measurable programme of upliftment.  

The IFP government will therefore focus on empowering learners to enter the knowledge-based job market even if this entails an overhaul of Outcomes Based Education We will assist schools with provision and maintenance of infrastructure and we will support teachers with training and incentives while keeping the focus on the practical needs and welfare of pupils. The IFP stands for free education up to and including Grade 12 and more affordable tertiary education. The IFP will deliver a workable School Feeding Scheme for those pupils who need one. We will reopen all teacher training colleges that were allowed to disintegrate.

Health, much like education, is in a state of crisis, mostly due to the fact that government is unable to implement its own policies. The current system falls sadly short of expectations and hospitals and clinics have deteriorated badly in recent years. This is reflected in a declining life expectancy for the average person and a shocking increase in the prevalence rate of HIV and Aids from 3% in 1994 to as high as 17% now. National government’s previous ambivalent attitude to combating HIV and Aids, its sympathy for anti-scientific quackery and Aids denialism hampered the effective rolling out of ARV and other treatment at provincial level and caused the loss of many lives. 

The challenge is thus to set up a system of public health that meets the normal needs of all sectors of society. The IFP government will therefore facilitate access to healthcare and cut waiting times. We will strive to close the gap between the quality of service offered in the public sector and that in the private sector. Where it is workable, we will decentralise healthcare to local level. We will reignite a sense of partnership and consultation between government and health professionals and traditional practitioners. And we will throw our weight behind a comprehensive plan to combat HIV and Aids. 

You will agree with me that society is judged by the way it treats its most vulnerable - those marginalised in and by society include people with disabilities, those infected with HIV and Aids, street children, abused women and children, the aged and many others. These vulnerable people are dependent on being helped by those who care - government and civil society. Without our joint intervention, they face a bleak future. Unfortunately, there is much that mitigates against a holistic approach to addressing the challenge. Included is the lack of capacity within government, a sometimes fragile civil society intervention, fraud, and serious under-funding. 

The immediate challenge of an IFP government is therefore to provide an appropriate response to the needs of the most vulnerable groups in society. In order to do this, the IFP government will strive to develop appropriate and well-funded internal capacity. This will involve depoliticising appointments, recruiting staff and establishing suitable internal infrastructure. We will deal ruthlessly with fraud which takes money from the needy. To address their immediate needs, we pledge to lobby national government for improvements in the grant system – the Basic Income Grant, R880 per month for the child grant to age 18, R1,500 per month for social pensions and a fixed grant for the HIV and Aids patients irrespective of their CD4 cell count.  

It is no secret that KwaZulu Natal has not developed to anywhere near its full economic potential, and indeed, in respect of key sectors, is performing poorly. For instance, there is large-scale disinvestment in commercial agriculture; there has been a relative decline in our manufacturing output; and tourism is not optimising its potential. Smaller towns lack effective local economic development strategies and are falling into decline. This is happening against a backdrop of massive unemployment and poverty where the people of the province are crying out for jobs and economic participation. 

But the potential of this province is enormous. The IFP government will work to create a business environment conducive to direct investment and job creation. We will restore Ithala Bank to its previous status as Africa’s most successful development corporation. We will build the Dube Tradeport-Durban-Richards Bay industrial/shipping/airfreight axis into southern Africa’s pre-eminent economic artery. We will develop KwaZulu Natal’s tourism industry to make the province an internationally sought after destination and Africa’s premier holiday destination. To assist in resolving the land claims impasse and crisis of confidence that is hastening the decline in agriculture. 

Housing delivery, too, has been slow because local municipalities do not have the capacity to play their role, planning processes are too slow and the provincial department does not have the skills to manage the processes. There is also the question of corruption in allocation of houses and allocation of contracts. Delays mean constant escalation of costs. A huge amount of money has been spent on housing but somewhat less on houses. It seems that the housing programme benefits housing contractors, sub-contractors and service providers more than those who are to receive houses. Similarly, there is rampant fraud in the provision of staff housing subsidies within the Provincial Department of Housing. 

The IFP government will ensure that all South Africans acquire, where necessary with government assistance, comfortable, safe and affordable shelter in properly planned communities with the necessary social amenities. This to be done in a manner that reverses historical planning ills that located communities along racial lines, away from work and other opportunities and that entrenched economic disparities. Housing delivery programmes must be carried out in a manner that helps stimulate local economic growth with the adverse effects of corruption and inept decisions which have in the past hampered housing delivery.

 Rural development is the key to combating poverty in KwaZulu Natal since more people and more poor people, live in the rural areas. Unfortunately, government’s urban bias and fractured response has hampered rural development and the situation has reached a point where rural communities have become poorer than they were in 1994. The lack of infrastructure in some areas is appalling. Rural schools have remained stagnant in a time of supposed modernization – lacking electricity, water, computers, libraries and other resources. The same degeneration applies to clinics and hospitals. Failure to promote SMMEs, agriculture and co-operatives has resulted in an exodus of people from the rural areas to towns and cities, adding to the numbers of the homeless and unemployed. 

The challenge is thus to implement a holistic approach towards rural development and in doing this, to integrate programmes centred on agriculture, education, health and economic development. The IFP government will prioritise a rural development strategy that allows people to make their own choices and work to achieve them with assistance from government when required. We will provide incentives to aspiring farmers, assist emerging farmers by making available loan finance, by facilitating partnerships, mentorship and skills transfer between them and commercial farmers and by establishing diversified and targeted education to cater for the vocational, technical and academic needs of rural life.  

Transport is key to economic development, communications and the quality of life of our people. Unfortunately, there are a number of important problems that are not being adequately dealt with. The road network has deteriorated to the extent that it sometimes threatens the safety of motorists and general public as well as future economic development. In many places road infrastructure is crumbling, largely due to overloading by heavy duty vehicles. The accident rate in the province is intolerably high, due largely to poor driver training and the extent of fraudulent driving licenses.  

The provincial government’s stake in the private taxi industry has unduly focused on regulation and hindrance rather than support and assistance, resulting in inefficiency and unnecessary conflict. Many key institutions in rural areas – such as clinics, schools and traditional courts - are serviced inadequately or not at all. The public transport subsidy scheme and its administration are extremely confusing and many bus services in the most depressed areas are not subsidised. Similarly, KwaZulu Natal is over-tolled and there are absurd and unfair plans to further toll motorists in the province. 

The province requires a comprehensive transportation strategy that involves all the key role players both in planning and implementation. The IFP government will refocus the Department of Transport on its core function which is to provide and maintain the road infrastructure and to tackle the multi-billion rand infrastructure backlog in the most critical areas – that is along the main lines of passenger transportation, in the rural areas and in alignment with current and future economic growth.  

We will address overloading of vehicles, fraud in the issuance of driving licenses and vehicle testing and bring transparency to the administration of the public transport subsidy scheme and to the awarding of contracts related to this scheme. We will bring the political will to deal with the issues of the taxi industry once and for all. We will promote road safety by concentrating policing activities on dealing more effectively with unsafe vehicles, unlicensed drivers, poor and dangerous driving. In all this, we pledge to lead by example by clamping down on the unjustified use of blue lights by government officials and by ensuring the manner in which the system functions is not abusive. 

Over the past five years, politics in KwaZulu Natal has become synonymous with graft and corruption while the people’s trust in government has steadily decreased. It does not help, of course, that those accused of corruption are rarely prosecuted or are suspended on generous conditions for an interminable period. It does not help either that instruments designed to fight corruption are themselves ignored, sidelined or closed down. The rot has to stop! 

The challenge for an IFP government will therefore be to fight corruption wherever it appears, to prosecute the offenders and to eliminate all forms of corruption from public life in KwaZulu Natal where it is close to becoming institutionalised. An effective anti-corruption strategy is required partly to end the theft of taxpayers’ money, which is happening on a vast scale, and partly because corruption is a strong disincentive to inward investment. No reputable company is willing to invest in a corrupt environment.  

We will begin by exposing all corruption and fraud over the past five years and by appointing, where necessary, Commissions of Inquiry to fully investigate wrongdoing. We will establish a special, dedicated anti-corruption court to fast-track the prosecution of offenders. We will empower – with far-reaching measures - the provincial Legislature to investigate corruption across government departments. We will motivate whistleblowers by rewarding them for information that leads to a successful prosecution for corruption instead of penalising them as is current practice. An IFP government commits itself to being open, honest, transparent and accountable. We will not tolerate corruption and will take all necessary steps to eradicate it.

This manifesto captures what the people of KwaZulu Natal have been saying to us over the past year during the course of the IFP’s Listening Campaign. We travelled the length and breadth of the province asking what it was you wanted to change in the administration of KwaZulu Natal to make your lives better over the next five years and beyond. We have taken all of your comments very seriously and we have integrated them into this document. This is therefore not an IFP manifesto - it is rather a joint manifesto - yours and ours. So, we have listened to you and we have recorded what you want done. The real test, however, lies in its implementation. 

We say we are “The Tried and Tested Alternative” because we have indeed been tried and tested over many years in government. And this experience has made us pragmatic, focused on doing what needs to be done and what really works. Our commitment to you is that if elected to run the province again, the IFP will do everything possible to bring this manifesto to life. Let’s do it, together. I urge you to vote IFP!