Hon Chairperson, hon Minister and hon Members of Parliament as well as my beloved intelligence community. I thank God for allowing me to be alive and well to participate today in the era when the African National Congress is in government. I love the ANC. [Applause.]
I most humbly express my gratitude and that of my organisation to the dedicated intelligence community of our land. These men and women work tirelessly under very difficult circumstances to protect all of us, at times without sufficient recognition and praise because they work in secret. Today I want to praise them in public. Long live the intelligence community, long live!
The 2010 Fifa World Cup is finally coming because you kept your eyes on the ball. You did not listen to the negative publicity of the prophets of doom. We salute you, may God give you courage and wisdom to continue working for the security of the government of South Africa. The ANC supports this budget.
Our founding document, the Freedom Charter, dictates that the people shall govern. It further entitles all South Africans, black and white alike, to take part in the administration of the country.
In 1994, as the ANC, we introduced accountability, a word unknown in the history of South Africa. We did that, because, when we pass this budget, we will stand equal to the task. We are going to scrutinise the operation and efficiency of the budget. We will call to account to the Joint Standing Committee on Intelligence, JSCI, the accounting officer, and we expect quarterly reports on time. We expect to be taken on board regarding any material occurrence on the budget of the department before, not after, the occurrence.
We expect financial statements prepared in line with generally accepted accounting practice and generally recognised accounting practice for your department and all your parastatals. All that must happen on time. We do not love historical explanation on material financial expenditure, because we are always available here to listen and, if need be, to physically come and verify.
My hon colleague, hon Coetzee, I want to assure you that there is no secret for us. We have been vetted, we have gone through the necessary processes and we have the right to know everything, and to this the JSCI and government shall account.
Finally, I want to advise the hon Minister and the department to co-operate with the Auditor-General because it is in your best interest. You must answer all the management letters, because the Auditor-General only needs to understand your circumstances. If you do that, it's going to make life easier for yourselves and the Auditor-General - we are not that interested in reading qualified reports.
I want us all to remember this. Always remember the importance of the centrality of Parliament to the process of democracy. Democratisation is not an event, it is an ongoing process, so it will take some time. I want to quote from this book by the Inter-Parliamentary Union of which I am a member, Parliamentary Oversight of the Security Sector:
The power of the past can and has to be used to ensure the best use of the allocation in a manner accountable to the public. One of Parliament's important mechanisms for controlling the executive is the budget. From the early days of the first assemblies in Western Europe, Parliaments demanded a say in policy matters, their claim being "naught exertion without representation". It remains essential that Parliament monitors the use of state's scarce resources, both effectively and efficiently.
I want to promise this House that we are equal to the task. We are going to monitor the expenditure. There is no way, as the ANC, that we are going to allow abuse of funds. Our President is very clear on that. He doesn't want corruption. We have to work in a manner that shows that we are serious as this country, because it doesn't matter how much we desire security; if the money is abused and we have no resources, we are not going to achieve that goal, and there is no way we are going to get money elsewhere. We've got to live with the money that we have. We've got to make sure that we satisfy the public that the monies of the state are secure.
I want to assure Mr Coetzee that the only secret is in our committee room. The secret documents go there. We read there, we write a report and we're not going to mark it secret if they have overspent the money. We are going to table it in the legislature without the secret. So accountability will still be there. We need to question government fearlessly and we are going to do that.
When it comes to matters of security, the party to which you belong is not important. You need to make sure that your utterances and what you say in public are in the best interest of the country, because when South Africa becomes unsafe, it becomes unsafe for all of us. I thank you. [Applause.]