Chair, hon members, I rise on behalf of the Eastern Cape to say that we are grateful as a province that you chose us for your visit. The people of Emalahleni, I promise you, will forever be grateful for that visit. They are hoping that all of us seated here will advocate their plight to better their lives as a collective. They are also expecting us not to point fingers, but to take Emalahleni as a classic case of a town in South Africa.
I must confess that reading the report was depressing. The report projects a forgotten village. While realising that much has been done, and much still has to be done, nothing good was acknowledged in that report, and my heart was so sore. I was hoping that in an executive summary we would trace the development of that particular area and acknowledge the fact that so much has been done or realised by the Eastern Cape.
As a province, yes, we have been in government for 14 years. We should not forget what we inherited - a town with no facilities. But during our era so much has been done. The tarred roads that we are talking about are a product of the interaction with us, and the infrastructure in the town is what we have put in place as a province which includes sanitation and electricity. Basically the town is a functional entity, unlike before, and that should be acknowledged.
Realising that the villages are where one finds the majority of inhabitants, it is important that as a province we have identified that the different spheres of government should plan and budget together. And when we visit these areas in the different provinces, we should make sure that our input-output is balanced. We need to make sure that, when we visit, we will be working together to monitor what we have put in place together. If we are not going to do that, we will never realise how far we are in terms of our development.
We can talk about fruitless and wasteful expenditure. Fortunately, we have had a debate on the Division of Revenue Bill and we all participated in that. Regarding those quotas that are quoted in the Division of Revenue Bill, surely, if you are to develop the Eastern Cape and even KwaZulu- Natal, that is not enough. We have been to other countries of the world and we are mindful of the fact that it takes so many years to develop an area such as Emalahleni.
With the infrastructural backlogs that we are faced with as a province, we need to step up with the Division of Revenue Bill. It is unfortunate that I didn't take part in that debate. I am just taking this opportunity to point out that the resources we are allocating to smaller towns will not assist them. It will take them years to get to where other areas are. The Eastern Cape, as a result of that, is faced with migrations from those areas to the Western Cape, without realising that those areas need far more development. The problem is that we still have to develop the bigger towns. So the priorities will forever change in our areas.
I am grateful for this opportunity, because I know as a collective we will do more. That is a slogan, but we need to put that into practice. Most of the areas that are highlighted in the report are the responsibility of the national government and not of the provincial government. The much-needed resource of water falls under the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry and that is a national competency. So we really request the House to advocate on our behalf with regard to those resources.
As a province, yes, we can do much more, but we can't do everything. We therefore want to encourage everybody seated here. You have seen the pilot in terms of Emalahleni. When our plight is debated, please, we would be forever grateful if you were to advocate for us when it comes to the division of revenue.
As a province we do recognise that Taking Parliament to the People is a very important tool to measure the achievements of our Millennium Development Goals. We do realise that, if we were to measure what we saw at Emalahleni as a replica of what is happening in other provinces, the pace at which we are allocating resources to the different areas will never realise the Millennium Development Goals we are hoping to achieve by 2014.
We are really grateful that you chose to visit Emalahleni. As the province of the Eastern Cape we will follow whatever we have to follow. I thank you. [Applause.]