Thank you very much, Chair. As I have indicated earlier on that tourism remains our priority and it has got the potential to create jobs, it has got the potential to ensure inclusive economic growth, it is a potential to make sure that it closes the gap between the haves and the haves not, and it is a labour intensive industry which needs semiskilled individuals.
We are working together as I've indicated with the SA Police Service to ensure that our tourists are safe and have pleasantly memories experiences when they visit our country. Both ourselves and the SA Police Service, SAPS, understand that in a sector with combine employment impact, direct and indirect of no less than 1,5 million, we have got an obligation to succeed.
A joint strategy and a memorandum of understanding that I've indicated between the department and the SA Police Service are in place and we are currently in a process of implementing it. All these efforts which are co- ordinated through the National Tourism Safety Forum that I've indicated are applied in targeted manner and stakeholders within affected localities, including municipalities, are part of this plan because we have identified tourism hotspot. Where we have identified tourism hotspot, we work together with the local business people there. We work together with the local council of municipalities in that area. We mobilise Community Policy Forum with the view that they then interact with communities. However, all of these things, hon Chair, will not yield any results until such time that ordinary people see benefits of tourism. As long as tourism peak is elitist and as long as there are no beneficiations from ordinary people that they can feel and see it, it will be very
difficult to mobilise them because they will not understand what it that is them as beneficiations for tourism is.
That's why, therefore, transformation of the tourism industry becomes paramount and key so that we are able to ensure that it becomes inclusive and there are beneficiations for all South Africans so that they see a value of protecting tourists, because there's beneficiation that they see as a result of tourists' arrival in South Africa. However, more importantly, we must also mobilise South Africans to be travellers so that we are able to expand the cake because we can't rely only on international tourists. We need to mobilise our own South Africans to be able to travel and explore their own country and enjoy it and know that it belongs to them before it belongs to anybody from outside. Thank you, Chair. [Applause.]