Chairperson, Minister, colleagues, it is International Women's Day and it is to be celebrated for there are many women who have fought for equal rights for women. Yes, women are allowed to vote, women now serve in Parliament - even in our country, where we have a very tragic history. We celebrate the fact that we can all vote and we do not have pass books to limit our movements.
Women should not be given equal rights but equal and open opportunities and we should not have token positions on boards and councils and in Parliament because of gender. Incidentally, when I wrote the speech, I wrote "sex" and I thought that was a bit much! Equal opportunities and access to education, training, science and technology - what does a pathway to decent work for women mean if there is no access to the former?
Yes, we celebrate a good many achievements of many women around the world who took their opportunities, but until we get the basics of basic education right in South Africa there is no equal access to education, science and technology - not for anybody, let alone our young ladies and women. That access is the only escape out of poverty.
Today shall be a call for all of us in Parliament to take cognisance of our duty to ensure that equal and open opportunities are created for all the people, including our young women, from the day they enter their first grade at school.
I want to remind you that in the Eastern Cape, our education department is in scandalous turmoil, with an overspent budget of R1,9 billion ... [Interjections.] ... yet there is underspend on conditional grants of R743 million. We also have problems in the district where Mrs Pankie Sizani has 99 ghost teachers in ghost schools in the early childhood development unit. We have 5 000 double-parked teachers who do not teach but 6 000 temporary teachers who need to be employed because they have been teaching children in the place of other teachers for two years. [Interjections.]