Citizens urged to reflect on 30 years of freedom
As South Africa marks 30 Years of Freedom, citizens have been urged to remember how far government has come in improving the lives of South Africans and undoing the damaging legacy of apartheid.
“We must not exercise our reflections and recollections without remembering exactly where we’ve come from or without acknowledging what has confronted us as a society in our journey to here,” Minister in the Presidency Khumbudzo Ntshavheni said in Cape Town.
Addressing a joint debate on the State of the Nation Address (SoNA), the Minister said despite the global economic meltdown of 2008
and the COVID-19 pandemic, government has continued to provide economic opportunities for citizens.
“Tintswalo or the Black Diamonds as they are generally referred to or the national breadwinners as they called themselves during the COVID-19 vaccination period, continue to lead the installation of digital connectivity in deep-rural KwaZuluNatal and other provinces. They work as young black and women engineers at our power stations,” the Minister said.
She said government has also provided opportunities for young people to work side by side to create a sovereign launch capability that has allowed the country to take satellite technologies into space and they are the bedrock of the more than 10 000 small, medium, and micro enterprises (SMMEs) that are suppliers to the National School Nutrition Programme.
The Minister said that young people are the engineers and contractors behind the more than 750 000 km road network from 525 000 km in 1995.
“Yes, some of the provincial and municipal roads have potholes but we are intervening. Currently the South African National Roads Agency (SANRAL) has taken over 2 600 km of roads transferred from provinces so we can use its road construction and maintenance capacity to deliver better roads and with more under consideration,” she said.
She added that in the past five years, SANRAL has executed projects to the value of R120 billion, which translated to just under 45 000 job opportunities and the participation of almost 6500 black owned SMMEs.