Hon Chairperson, hon Minister, Members of Parliament and guests, my Chief Whip, hon J H van der Merwe, has asked that I tell you, hon Minister, that you look very smart today.
During this year's state of the nation address President Zuma made a fleeting reference to our ICT sector. He mentioned fibre optic cables and the plan to achieve full broadband by 2020. But that was all. Gone was the kind of bold statement our President made in 2009, when he promised that government would reduce the cost of communications.
This new-found reticence is not surprising. This department has become, as one newspaper recently put it, "a poisoned chalice". The department is now under scrutiny by Parliament and others. Serious damage is being done by the persistent allegations of corruption, nepotism and cadre deployment, which allegedly saw politically connected individuals land jobs within the Department of Communications' entities.
The now infamous ICT Indaba, which cost the Department of Communication just over R100 million, has left us with more questions than answers. To put this in context, with R100 million we could have provided some 1 000 schools with the necessary equipment for at least 20 computer laboratories. That would have been a fitting use for taxpayers' money. Instead, R100 million was spent on an indaba looking at ways to develop the ICT sector.
With this noble goal the IFP has no qualms. But did the indaba amount to anything more than an expensive talk-shop, aimed at benefiting a few politically connected individuals? We might never know. It is the IFP's view that nothing less than a full commission of inquiry will help us get to the bottom of these alleged scandals. South Africans deserve answers.
Instability remains the Department of Communications' Achilles' heel. We have had five Ministers in five years. This has stalled progress on critical projects such as DTT and the broadcasting and ICT review process. With each change of Minister, there seems to have been insignificant cognisance of the need for stability in the Ministry. Instability within the department has permeated all its entities. We have seen the decline of the SABC and Telkom. The SA Post Office, as the Minister has mentioned, has been crippled by strikes. While the SABC remains in the intensive care unit, it is unclear why the cash-strapped broadcaster continues to provide free airtime worth millions of rands to the Gupta-owned The New Age newspaper. The taxpayer already funds such a service in the form of the Government Communication and Information System, GCIS. Surely, if our public broadcaster has to double up on this service, it should be to the benefit of all South Africans, showcasing all views and all political parties. This arrangement cannot be to the benefit of a few. Tomorrow this House will debate Guptagate, but Guptagate is much wider than just Waterkloof Air Force Base. It extends to other institutions and entities.
The IFP agrees that steering the SABC back to health is our priority. We need to restore the credibility of the SABC. For that to happen, cadre deployment must stop. Let me pause here, though, and pay tribute, as the hon Muthambi has done, to all the dedicated staff, especially the journalists, who work under extremely difficult circumstances, yet keep the lights in the SABC running as well as quality news programmes on our TVs. They are doing a remarkable job. Let me also take this opportunity to pay tribute on behalf of the IFP to the SABC icon, Mr Vuyo Mbuli. We mourn the loss of a great journalist and a great South African.
The challenges that I have highlighted are by no means all the challenges facing this department. But they are critical challenges. In the face of all this, the department's rhetoric is unchanged. It remains confident that nothing will stop it from ensuring that all South Africans have access to world-class ICT services. How much of this has materialised? The stark reality is that to date not a lot has been done to deliver on these promises.
The IFP is astonished that the President can still speak so confidently about meeting the target of 100% broadband when this department has yet to deliver on their current targets. When one considers that an increase in broadband penetration is linked to an increase in the gross domestic product, GDP, it is astonishing that we are not putting more effort into reaching these targets now. A failure to do so will not only jeopardise South Africa's economic growth, but also the National Development Plan,