Mr Speaker, hon members, the election of Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma heralds a new era for the continent, as it is the first time that the AU Commission will be led by a woman. The AU, therefore, has affirmed its resolution to make this a decade for women. Minister Dlamini-Zuma has also made history by being the first chairperson from the SADC region. We congratulate her on her election.
Hon members, as a loyal member of the AU, South Africa will play its role and provide support to make the institution successful in its programmes of promoting unity, peace, stability, prosperity and democracy on the continent. Dr Dlamini-Zuma has identified some priorities for the continent during her tenure, in which we will support her, and they are: eradicating poverty and conflicts; building sustainable economies through infrastructure to promote intra-Africa trade, among others; consolidating democracy and good governance in our respective countries; promoting education, health, shelter and job creation; accelerating our integration in all spheres with regional economic communities, RECs, as the building blocks; and advancing and defending the interests of Africa in global affairs.
With regard to promoting economic development, there are some emerging positive trends that position Africa as the next big investment frontier over the next 50 years. Africa is the third fastest growing region after Asia and the Middle East. We will support the AU in taking advantage of these opportunities to further promote regional integration and the New Partnership for Africa's Development, Nepad.
Currently, moves are afoot to ensure a successful integration of the Common Market of East and Southern Africa, Comesa, the East African Community and SADC, which bring together a market of more than 600 million people. With regard to infrastructure development, South Africa chairs the Nepad Presidential Infrastructure Champion Initiative.
We have been tasked with championing the North-South Road and Rail Development Corridor projects, which will extend from Cape Town and Durban to Cairo. Work will also continue to strengthen the co-operation of Regional Economic Communities to ensure success. At a political level we will play our role in promoting the voice of the continent in world affairs and to eradicate the interference in African affairs that we witnessed, particularly last year, in the cases of Libya and Cte d'Ivoire.
We will also assist with capacity-building and any other support the AU will require to achieve its objectives. Thank you.
Somlomo, angibonge uMongameli waseNingizimu Afrika ngempendulo enhle kangaka asinikeze yona. Okokuqala, siyizakhamuzi zaseNingizimu Afrika siyathokoza kakhulu ngeqhawekazi laseNingizimu Afrika elinjengoNkosazane Zuma, lo odume ngokuthi u"Mrs Fix it" uzokwazi ukuthi aye le ku-AU ayilungise. Ngoba ngempela ngempela iminyaka eminingi lapha izizwe zangaphandle bezizenzela nje lapha eNingizimu Afrika. Siyathokoza ukuthi futhi uhulumeni kaMongameli u-JZ uzoqhubeka weseke i-AU noKhomishana omusha uNkosazana Zuma.
Ngakho Mongameli, engithanda ukukubuza yilokhu: Siyazi ukuthi njengoba u- Comrade Nkosazane ekhulume ngokulwa nobuphofu, into yokuqala yokulwa nobuphofu wukuthi iNingizimu Afrika ne-Afrika yonkana kumele ikwazi ukudayisa izimpahla zayo ngaphandle. Siyazi ukuthi izinhlangano ezifana nabo-TTO nama-EU zicindezele amazwe amancane ase-Afrika ngokuthatha izinqumo ezingeke zibeke i-Afrika phambili. Ingabe umbuso kaMongameli uzokwazi yini ukunikeza amandla ko-TTO ukuze kuliwe nabo-EU nawo wonke lawa mazwe anamandla ukuze i-Afrika ibe ngcono? Ngiyabonga.
UMONGAMELI WASENINGIZIMU AFRIKA: Lungu elihloniphekile, umkhankaso wokulwisana nalawa mabhange amakhulu kazwelonke maqondana nokuthi azisebenzisa kanjani izimali emazweni amancane usunethuba uqhubeka. Sizowuqhuba-ke lowo mzabalazo, ikakhulukazi maqondana nokuthi uma kusizwa lawa mazwe amancane awangabekelwa imigomo elukhuni kakhulu eyenza ukuthi kwale mali ebiwusizo ijike isifana neketango eliboshelwe entanyeni kulawa mazwe amancane.
Sizoyilwa-ke leyo mpi kakhulu. Siyilwa futhi ngendlela yokuthi sithi kudingeka kube noshintsho ebuholini bawo la mabhange ngoba ukuthi bangabi bikho abantu abaqhamuka emazweni asathuthuka lapha ebuholini yikho kanye okwenza ukuthi izinqumo ezithathwayo zithathwa ngabantu abangayazi inhlupheko nabangazi ukuthi yiluphi usizo olufunekayo. Siyethemba-ke ukuthi kulowo mkhankaso sizobe sindawonye noSihlalo omusha we-AU. Ngiyabonga (Translation of isiZulu paragraphs follows.)
[Mr B A RADEBE: Speaker, I wish to thank the President of South Africa for such a good response. Firstly, as South Africans, we are so proud of our heroine from South Africa, Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, who is popularly known as "Mrs Fix It". We know that she will perform her duties at the AU to the best of her ability. For many years, foreign countries did not give South Africa the respect and recognition that it deserved. We are pleased that President Zuma's government will continue to give its support to the AU and its new Chairperson, Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma.
Following that, President, I have this question for you: Comrade Nkosazana has pointed out the fight against poverty as her top priority. The first way to tackle the issue of poverty would be to facilitate trade between South Africa, and the rest of Africa, as well as other countries in the international arena. We know that organisations like the TTO and the EU are oppressing Africa by taking decisions that put the continent at a disadvantage. Mr President, will your government be able to influence the TTO to fight against the EU and all the powerful countries for the betterment of Africa? Thank you.
Hon member, the campaign to fight the central banks of powerful countries regarding the manner in which they use funds for foreign aid aimed at development assistance has been going on for quite some time. We will continue the fight, especially with regard to conditions that are laid down for developing countries when they are provided with foreign aid. These conditions tend to be too stringent and the developing countries find it difficult to comply with them.
We are going to intensify this fight. We want the governorship of these powerful banks to include representatives from developing countries. Their lack of such representatives results in their taking uninformed decisions about the kind of foreign aid needed since they do not have first-hand knowledge of the extent of poverty in such countries. We hope that the new chairperson of the AU will join us in this campaign. Thank you.]
Mr Speaker, let us say from this side of the House that we congratulate and welcome the fact that Dr Dlamini-Zuma is now the chairperson of the AU Commission, and we will pay appropriate tribute to her next week in the House, I gather. My question to the President is this: If she is going to succeed - and we want her to succeed - we have to surround her with competent, capable people who can do the job. The problem with that is that the salaries that are attached to the posts there are less than salaries that adequate people would earn in South Africa or maybe other African countries.
What are we going to do in that regard to make sure that she is appropriately empowered with staff? How can we do that when African countries as a whole are not actually contributing towards the AU budget? Only 40% of the AU budget comes from African countries. And I would be very careful about fighting with the EU and other countries because the EU, America and, in fact, China contribute the other 60% of the AU budget.
So, what we have to do, and that is my other question to you, Mr President, is to fundamentally restructure the financing of the AU so that Africans make contributions to the governance of their continent, and we in South Africa have to lead in that context. In so doing we will empower Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma to actually play the role that she needs and/or we need her to play. Thank you. [Applause.]
Mr Speaker, I think the question asked by the hon member is absolutely important. It is one of the questions which I believe the new chairperson of the AU will work on; it is a question in many directions. Firstly, there is the fact that the AU, after so many years, in terms of the bigger percentage of its finances, depends on the friends, so to speak, that limit the independence of the AU to take its own independent decisions. Certainly, because the people who hold the funds would pull the strings somehow or other, as the hon member is indicating; that is one of the issues that this new chair must address. And when she addresses those issues, she certainly needs the support of all of us. It starts with remuneration, but more importantly, the funds that would help the AU to carry out the programmes of the continent.
There are examples of difficulties that she has already discovered. For example, why is it that in other areas Africa could not move more quickly in dealing with the challenges of the continent? Precisely because if those donors or supporters don't want the AU to intervene with a different kind of approach and they want their own approach, then they could say that Africa cannot use their money for this approach or that one.
That is one of the challenges that the AU must work on and in fact develop an independent fund for. We must be able to deal with the countries that are not financing the organisation. That is one of the tasks that she will have to undertake, including the issue of the other countries, if that information is true - that they are not paying their own subscriptions. I think we should have a mechanism that must change the running of the organisation.
That is why, when we were campaigning, we projected that we need change in the AU to transform it so that it can work to advance the interests of the African people on the continent. So, that is one of the critical issues that we will all have to support her on, because I think she is already thinking about those matters. Thank you.
Mr Speaker, I am glad to hear that I am the Koornhof on your left. [Laughter.]
Hon President, the Reserve Bank announced earlier this week that South Africa's current account deficit is now the highest it's been in four years. That is because of subdued market conditions, especially in China and in Europe, which are our major trading partners. I think the hon President will agree with me that we should trade more with Africa. Don't you think that it is time for the AU to implement a preferential trade tariff between African countries to assist our export market?
Let me explain why I am asking this. Currently, we pay the same tariff as Europe or Chile when they export their wine to Africa. So, there is no incentive for an African country, say Kenya or Nigeria, to buy our wines. For the wine industry to be competitive, it starts by exporting in bulk. And by exporting 10 million litres of wine in bulk, we lose 107 jobs in this country. So, I hope that with the two Zumas on this continent now, you will get us the preferential tariffs so that we can trade easily. [Laughter.]
Mr Speaker, I am sure the hon member's question was what he mentioned at the end - that is what he actually wanted to say. [Laughter.]
Well, as I indicated in the first part of my reply, Africa is aware of the problem. It is a historical problem in that Africa was colonised, and each part of Africa is called a country, and it had a mother country and that mother country was very possessive of its colonies - all of them. It was only the mother country that dealt with its colony, and no one else. So, if you had countries in Africa that were neighbours and one was under Portugal and the other under the French, they were not allowed to do any business together; until Africa decolonised itself from that system and changed it.
Therefore, you are now dealing with an Africa that is saying, let us work together. That is why I talked about the integration of regions here, which are economic regions. In addition, we are working on the infrastructure to connect Africa so that we can promote intra-Africa trade. That is what Africa is doing and that is what the other Zuma is going to do to ensure that that programme is indeed implemented. Because without that, even if we say today that Africa is growing faster, without Africa trading within itself, it will be very weak.
I hope the leaders in Africa have appreciated that, and we are therefore working very hard to ensure that we quicken that process. We can only quicken it by having infrastructure that connects us with land, air, sea or the huge lakes that we have. I think we will be supporting that particular Zuma on that programme.
Mr Speaker, Mr President, the chairperson of the AU will be going to Ethiopia next month. Has there been an indication, as the hon Davidson said, that some of the staff that she wants to take with her will have to take salary cuts? To ask a direct question, Mr President, can you confirm to this House whether she has approached government for assistance in that regard; and if she has, what nature of assistance are you going to give to her so that she has the necessary staff to take with her to Ethiopia?
Secondly, we all know that the campaigning period for the chairmanship was very gruelling; to the extent that the election had to be repeated. What efforts does government have now to iron out the differences and the cleavages that were so visibly explicit in the campaign to ensure that the vision of the AU is not compromised and to ensure that the new chairperson does not have difficultly in executing her duties? Because, before she became the SADC candidate, she was, first of all, a South African and she needs us as South Africans to be behind her. Thank you.
Mr Speaker, certainly, we should support the new chairperson, and I think we will deal with the reality of how we should support her as and when it comes. We should agree, generally, as this House, that if we need to support her in order for her to succeed in this important work, this House will support government to support her. I think that commitment is absolutely important, because we must support her. The mere fact that we have a person coming from here with clarity on what we need to do implies that the resolution of the problems of the continent would, in fact, become the resolution of the problems of our country.
Therefore, I think there should be a general agreement that we will support her. However, we have to see what types of challenges she faces and what types of support she needs. I think I would be inclined to say that we should help.
With regard to the unity of the continent, I know that some people say that Africa is divided, particularly those who have time to write and imagine things. I am not sure how much they know about Africa because there is nothing that has gone wrong. In the first place, there was a democratic election, following a democratic campaign. I don't understand why, if there is a campaign and people are contesting positions, then people begin to say there is a fight! There is now erosion of relations. What else do you do in a democracy? Unless you say that democracy must be managed, having one person contesting and others keeping quiet. But the nature of democracy is that people should contest. It does not mean that by contesting they are then fighting. We contested with a number of countries in Africa just as the Gabonese candidate was contesting; they crisscrossed the continent just as we did.
We clearly put across the political objectives, why we were saying we needed change, and how we needed the AU to operate differently so that we would be more effective in dealing with matters. There is no country that we were at loggerheads with. We were actually discussing with them. We also challenged them to convince us; unfortunately, there was no argument that came from them to state why the other candidate was better than ours, and we were then able to advance.
That is why, through political persuasion on the principles and objectives of the continent, we were able to win the majority. There was no disunity that was created. And I wish you were in the AU when she finally won, you would have realised how united the African continent was behind her. She has been accepted by all; even those who had contested came back and said they were very happy with that election. So, there is not much work that we have to do because there was no damage during the election. This is just the speculations of people who always think that they know better about Africa. [Applause.]
Position regarding provision of funding for Nkandla-Mlalazi Smart Growth Centre
14. The Leader of the Opposition (DA) asked the President of the Republic:
Whether he, in pursuance of the Comprehensive Rural Development Programme, instructed his Ministers to provide funding and a budget for the Nkandla-Mlalazi Smart Growth Centre; if not, what is the position in this regard, if so, which Ministers?