Chairperson, Ministers and Deputy Ministers, hon members, senior management of the departments, ladies and gentlemen, government acknowledges the important task of addressing the legacy of apartheid to ensure that all our people experience the benefits of freedom.
The deliberate neglect of rural areas causes serious harm to our communities. The majority of South Africans were confined to the Bantustans and townships that were totally neglected. As we all know, even the townships, which were largely created in urban areas, had relatively little development, which did not meet the bare minimum needs of our people. Townships were created merely to provide labour for the factories and domestic needs of the minority.
Laws were created to ensure that our people could not feed themselves anymore and thus were forced to seek employment away from their places of residence. Urbanisation and its concomitant social economic ills were unleashed upon us. It is for this reason that the ANC-led government in 1994 recognised a need for a process to reconstruct our country.
Rural development, which represents the constituencies of members of this House, continues to be one of the priority areas of our government. This government is committed to tackling the social ills through the social cohesion programme, which is led by the Department of Arts and Culture. Our sector plays a significant role in social regeneration, unity and reconciliation.
We have identified the popularisation of national symbols, national days and the standardisation of geographical names in South Africa as pillars of our strategy to foster national identity. We will install South African flags in all schools and promote the proper singing of the national anthem.
We have launched the Fly the Flag Campaign for soccer in collaboration with other stakeholders in April 2009. The aim of the campaign is to encourage patriotism and use the excitement created by the Confederations Cup to promote national symbols. We have, so far, distributed more than 100 000 hand-held flags to South Africans across the country.
Between the months of May to June 2009, our campaign focused on the four Fifa Confederations Cup host cities, namely Bloemfontein, Johannesburg, Pretoria and Rustenburg. A total of two days were spent at each city. The first day involved the branded double-decker bus that drove through each city and stopped at each taxi rank. Hand-held flags were distributed, as well information pamphlets on national symbols. We conducted competitions in the singing of the national anthem where each winner was given four Confederations Cup tickets.
The second day was dedicated to university campuses where students were treated to music by popular DJs and similar competitions on national symbols were conducted. From 20 May to 3 June 2009 we visited the Central University of Technology in Bloemfontein, the University of Johannesburg, North West University in Mafikeng and Tshwane University of Technology.
Our department continues to promote oral history as part of our efforts to ensure that our heritage landscape is indeed reflective of our national memory and contributes to nation-building and identity. We will promote oral history, especially among marginalised communities whose heritage and history have been ignored for many years. Later this year we will host the Annual National Oral History Conference in Cape Town to ensure that we preserve the rich heritage of our nation for posterity.
The ANC-led government is committed to the principle of universal access to the arts as stated in our Constitution. This means that we must provide the necessary infrastructure to enable people, particularly in rural areas, to practise their art. Currently we have a lot of art centres throughout the country, but some of them are dysfunctional and do not have the necessary programmes that respond to the needs of the people.
We have decided to come up with a revitalisation programme to ensure that the art centres continue to serve our communities. This year, we will establish a cultural centre of excellence per province. The plan is to use these centres as flagships or models for the rest of community art centres in the provinces. The plan is ultimately to restore quality art programmes in all our centres.
We will support the promotion of people's art in community art centres through encouraging local theatre and music groups, local cultural forms of expression and other creative work. The national government will provide training in the management of art centres and ensure that programming is effective, that is, that these centres are used for what they were created for. Provincial and local government spheres will be responsible for the day-to-day management of the centres.
Choral music continues to be one of our main forms of cultural expression. Every community has some form of a choir and we regard this art form as very participatory in nature, because it is practised by both the young and the old in our society. We will conduct nationwide consultation with the sector to ensure that our policy framework represents the aspirations of our people.
Part of the Department of Arts and Culture's mandate is also to develop and promote our official languages. In this financial year, we will table before Cabinet the South African language practitioners Bill for promulgation. We'll also have an annual campaign to promote multilingualism with effect from this financial year. We will continue to assist departments and provinces to establish their language units.
Creative industries make a significant contribution to job creation, particularly in rural areas. South Africa, notwithstanding its rich history of beading, does not produce beads, but imports them from other countries. The department is currently working with our embassy in the Czech Republic and factories in that country towards the possible establishment of partnerships. This will ensure that our crafters will buy the materials here at home at a better price and work from their bases in the provinces.
Our department has also identified the technical services and events industry as an important element of economic and job creation. We have completed a study to reposition and transform this key industry to ensure that jobs and business opportunities for previously disadvantaged individuals are created. Government is a key consumer of the technical services through its various events and exhibitions. We must make sure that we use this muscle.
This year, South Africa, together with other nations of the world, will celebrate the life, values and ideas of Isithwalandwe Nelson Mandela. July 18 has been declared Nelson Mandela Day. We call upon everyone to dedicate 67 minutes of their time on July 18 for the goodwill of others and service to humanity. The Department of Arts and Culture, together with Parliament, will co-ordinate government's participation in the activities planned for the Mandela Day. I therefore urge all members of this House to participate in this programme.
In conclusion, I would also like to take this opportunity to congratulate our soccer team, Bafana Bafana, for their excellent performance during the Confederations Cup. Our department will continue to work with the local organising committee to ensure that we present an unforgettable African experience. There is no doubt that the world has been bowled over, not only by our ability to organise large events, but also by our culture, customs, cuisines and heritage. Thank you. [Applause.]