3 July 2007
Programme Director;
Executive Mayors and Speakers;
Vice Chancellor;
Religious Minister;
HODs and Municipal Managers;
Ward Councillors and Ward Committees Members;
Local Government Seta CEO Sidwell Mofokeng;
Representatives from the Department of Public Service & Administration;
Distinguished Guests;
Members of the Media;
Ladies and Gentlemen
Today marks yet another historic moment since government introduced and embraced the concept of Community Development Workers in response to the President's call. In his State of the Nation Address in 2003, President Thabo Mbeki called for a different kind of civil servant that will serve communities in the areas where they live.
Allow me to quote the President verbatim: "The government will create a public service echelon of multi-skilled community development workers who will maintain direct contact with the people where the masses live. We are determined to ensure that government goes to the people so that we sharply improve the quality of the outcomes of public expenditures intended to raise the standards of living of our people."
Following the Presidents pronouncement, work began in earnest to realize the objectives of the CDW Programme. This culminated in the launch of the programme in Gauteng by Public Service and Administration Minister Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi and Premier Mbhazima Shilowa in 2005. Since then we have made strides in ensuring that we meet our commitment of deploying at least one CDW in all the wards in Gauteng. Today's graduation represents the coming of age of 232 more cadet CDW's, that are ready for deployment as foot soldiers in our government's quest to push back the frontiers of poverty and to translate the slogan " A better life for all" in to a tangible reality. You and those of your peers who graduated last July after a rigorous learnership programme through UNISA are indeed a welcome addition to the public service. While you are employed in terms of the Public service regulations, your work is far different from that of other public servant. For starters you will be deployed in wards and in communities in which you live and in conditions far removed from the luxury of posh and air-conditioned offices like other civil servants. Yours is to link communities to the services that Government provides and thereby ensure that Government services and programmes reach the target communities. This will also necessitate that you should be able to articulate the lived experiences of the communities to Government in order to ensure that Government's policies have the desired outcomes. To achieve the latter you have to be prepared to work under different weather conditions - rain or sunshine, snowy cold or scotching hot sun.
Programme Director;
It is prudent to reiterate, what the CDW already know with respect to their role.
The first is that a CDW is not an elected public representative and can for that reason alone not purport to have a constituency or assume the role of public representative. In any given ward, there is only one legitimate public representative, and that is the Ward Councillor. There can not and should not be any confusion in this regard. You are civil servants and you are there to compliment and augment the work of the councillors, not to compete with councillors. As CDWs, you are accountable to councillors and cannot call public meetings.
You are civil servants working in communities and must ensure that there's development in the areas you have been deployed. In other words a CDW is a resource to the community, working with and through the Ward Councillor and Ward Committee to advance the development of the community. As CDWs, you are accountable to councilors and cannot call public meetings willy-nilly because you are encroaching in the territory of elected leaders.
Also you are not supposed to be politically-biased when dealing with community issues. Some of you are affiliated to certain political parties, however the important thing is to make sure that South Africans who have not benefited from the democracy and have no access to government information and services despite the difference in religion, political affiliation, race or gender, Yours is to serve the people of the country with pride and dignity.
Operationally, the CDWs are located in all the fourteen municipalities in the province. The location is deliberate as they are expected to work closely with all stakeholders across local government. These stakeholders include mayors, councillors, ward committees and other officials employed by local government. The municipalities are tasked with assisting and providing support and supervision of the CDW activities.
Programme Director;
I know that many of the CDWs are doing and continue to do an incredible work in communities and it is important that we recognize and acknowledge that. Some people today have got smile on their faces because of the contribution of the CDWs. I always say to CDWs on all occasion when I address them that at the end of each day they must be able to say "I have made a difference … Communities are happy because of my assistance."
The work you are doing is bearing fruit and you should be commended for that. I know of a CDW who assisted an 80 year-old man to access an identity document and another who assisted a 108 year-blind granny and her 85 year-old daughter to obtain, for the first time in their lives ownership of proper houses. A place they can finally and proudly call home. Our civil service is not geared to assist and provide service to communities in the comfort of their homes. Providing a service to communities at a time and place convenient to the community is one of the key success factors of the CDW programme. The CDWs will ultimately be judged by the extent to which they enhanced access to services by the community. Some parts of the province have in the past few months experienced escalations in so called service delivery demonstrations. Critical to the role of the CDW is to pick up simmering discontent and to bring this to the attention of the relevant authorities for action and resolution before they degenerate in to sometimes distractive actions accompanied by damage to public infrastructure.
More critical in this regard are the systems that we need to fine tune to ensure that individual CDWs are supported in the work that they do.
This may include the manner in which CDW are supervised, assisted to access relevant decision makers, assisted to escalate issues that require urgent action and the general cooperation that they require from sector departments both provincially and nationally. The conduct and dress code of CDWs is important and I would like to urge you to dress presentably and behave in an appropriate manner. You must bear in mind that your are civil servants. Therefore, as CDWs your mandate is to:
Programme Director;
Let me take this opportunity to also indicate that my department will commission a study to look into the efficacy of the implementation of the CDW programme in Gauteng. This is intended to yield findings that will assist us to further improve on the work of the CDWs to ensure maximum impact in communities that we serve.
I wish all the graduates the best in all their endeavours in making a difference in their respective communities It is important that the certificates being handed here today should be used to open a world of possibilities that exist in the public service.
I thank you.