Hon House Chairperson, hon members of this august House, we must always bear in mind that from the outset, our strategic objective was to achieve the right to decide our political, social and economic future. The democratic breakthrough of 1994 afforded us ample opportunity to decide our political future and to build the democratic institutions necessary to guarantee our civil and political rights.
This was the first phase of our transition to a national democratic society, which is united, nonracial, nonsexist and prosperous, and in which the value of every citizen is measured by our common humanity, ubuntu botho. The democratic institutions we have built are adequate for this purpose.
The 53rd National Conference of the ANC characterised the present as the second phase of our transition to a national democratic society. This means that the time has come for us to decide our own social and economic future. The moral decay or degeneration rooted in our dark and unjust past has become the greatest threat to our second phase of the transition.
Those who blame the democratic government and President Jacob Zuma, in particular, for the moral decay have chosen to forget that moral decay is not the product of our democratic dispensation. It is rooted in our dark and unjust past, and thrives because of degrading and dehumanising socioeconomic conditions resulting from the triple challenges of poverty, unemployment and inequality. These challenges are rooted in the apartheid legacy.
Since the formation of the supremacist, racist union of South Africa, no government has done as much as this ANC government to combat moral decay. A little bit of historical background will aid our recollection of the glorious achievements of this government. Gang rape, corruption, Satanism, upsurges in violence, sexual assaults of women and children, drug and alcohol abuse have united the country in its outrage and in the condemnation of such acts against the defenceless and the vulnerable in our communities.
Let us repeat that violations of human rights are rooted in our dark and unjust past. The promotion and protection of human rights and, in particular, the fight against moral decay, is not the duty of government alone, but also that of all South Africans, both black and white.
Our icon Nelson Mandela put this in more definite and emphatic terms, and I quote:
In striving for our goals we must dispel the idea that change can come from government alone, while our people wait passively for delivery. As we were our own liberators, so too must we change our own lives for the better. However good our new laws may be on paper, they must be implemented and enforced before they bring benefits to workers and others. However good the policies of the government are, nothing will come of them without the active participation of each and every one of us.
Emphasising this point recently, President Jacob Zuma, in his address at the official opening of the National House of Traditional Leaders in Parliament, commented on the recent violent and shocking incidents which reverberated across the country and stated that this:
... should shock us into positive action, by making us focus on what can bind us as the South African nation. We must identify how we can support families and households in distress, strengthen our communities and take forward the mission of building a caring, united and prosperous society.
Sexual violence and the abuse of women and children, drug and alcohol abuse and other inhuman activities perpetrated against the vulnerable in our society threaten to derail the second phase of our transition. Our Constitution embodies the values of a just and caring society which we must promote. What we have witnessed in recent weeks points to the fact that the process of social cohesion, nation-building and reconciliation remains under threat from the very real disparities between the rich and poor, black and white, women and men, rural and urban. These widening gaps between the haves and the have-nots continue to undermine our reconciliation efforts and pose a great threat to nation-building. These factors result from the legacy of apartheid that this government is doing its outmost to overcome.
The National Development Plan concurs that the moral decay could be linked to the legacy of colonialism and apartheid. In its 2009 election manifesto, the ANC undertook to work with the National Interfaith Movement, amongst others, to build cohesive, caring and sustainable communities. It undertook to work with the nine provincial interfaith forums for that purpose.
In the 8 January 2010 Statement, the ANC proclaimed that human development has spiritual and material aspects. In pursuit of this, both Houses of Parliament passed a resolution that created a Parliamentary Interfaith Council to facilitate partnerships between Parliament and interfaith organisations in the quest to create a new nation, united in its diversity. We wish to dedicate this debate to the role of the religious sector in the creation of socially cohesive, caring and sustainable communities.
Madiba anticipated the challenges of moral decay and its negative effect on the second phase of our transition. In this regard, Madiba taught us that spiritual transformation is a prerequisite for social and economic transformation. He defines spiritual transformation as the reconstruction and development programme - the RDP - of the soul.
For Madiba freedom also included the opportunity for the mind, soul and body to fulfil themselves. In other words, spiritual transformation includes the decolonisation of the mind. The moral decay or degeneration that we inherited from our dark and unjust past also resulted from adulterated religions which give rise to claims of Satanism. There is no unanimity on the definition of Satanism and where it comes from. Unless this matter is addressed properly, it could lead to the polarisation of the religious sector and lead to interreligious conflicts.
All in all, this moral decay deprives our people of self-knowledge, self- esteem, self-worth, a culture of self-help and self-reliance and the will for development and progress.
These values are required for social and economic transformation. No wonder that the Ethiopian movement, in which the seeds of the ANC were sown, emphasised self-esteem, self-help and self-reliance from its inception in the 1870s. Taking his cue from Ethiopianism and its Pan-African ideal, Madiba made moral regeneration an integral part of social and economic transformation. Madiba also took active steps to make spiritual transformation a prerequisite for social and economic transformation.
In 1997 Madiba convened a national religious summit which culminated in the formation of the National Religious Leaders' Forum, the NRLF. This forum produced a code of conduct for people in positions of authority and the Bill of Rights and Responsibilities.
In 1999 President Mandela convened the Morals Summit which resulted in the launch of the Moral Regeneration Movement, the MRM, by then Deputy President Jacob Zuma in 2002. The MRM produced the Charter of Positive Values, which has been widely distributed. No other organisation has done more than the ANC-led government to combat moral decay.
At his inauguration as the fourth President of the Republic, hon President Zuma called for partnership between government and all sectors for reconstruction, development and progress. In response, progressive religious leaders founded the National Interfaith Leaders Council, Nilc, which adopted a spiritual or moral and secular approach to development.
The Nilc adopted the social gospel, which was advocated by, inter alia, the late Sister Bernard Ncube, Father Smangaliso Mkhatshwa, Beyers Naud and others during the 1980s. This social gospel informed the programme to combat racism adopted by the World Council of Churches in the 1980s. The NRLF and Nilc merged on 2 September 2011, to form the National Interfaith Council of SA, Nicsa. Nicsa and Lead SA partnered with the Department of Basic Education to roll out the Bill of Rights and Responsibilities in all nine provinces, as part of the national effort to combat moral degeneration and inculcate ubuntu values and principles in the youth and children. Nicsa has also endorsed the presidential campaign against rape and abuse of learners in schools.
President Zuma told this august House that the recovery of the common humanity of all South Africans has been the cornerstone of ANC policy from its inception. The President directly linked the recovery of our common humanity with the triple challenges of poverty, unemployment and inequality.
The President's summit on social cohesion and nation-building confirmed this direct link between the triple challenges of poverty, unemployment and inequality. In his opening address, the President said, and I quote:
The challenges of poverty, unemployment, homelessness, landlessness and the division of race, class and gender make it difficult to arrive at a socially cohesive and united society as fast as we would want to. Our responsibility as government is to lead the South African people towards a national democratic society. This is a society that is united, nonsexist, nonracial, democratic and prosperous ...