Address by Hon. Premier TSP Makwetla  at the Heriatage Day celebrations

Matsulu Stadium

24 September 2007

Programme Director,

Executive Mayor of Mbombela Municipality, Cllr. Justice Nsibande,

Honourable Members of the Executive Council,

Honourable Mayors and councilors,

Religious Leaders,

Officials in the Public Service,

The People of Mpumalanga,

Comrades and friends,

Ladies and gentleman

On the occasion of celebrating the Heritage Day, we must be reminded of our rich and diverse heritage that defines our past as the people of Mpumalanga and reflect on how it contributes to our shared sense of nationhood and social cohesion.

As a multi-racial and multi-cultural society, our living heritage reflects diverse traditions, rituals, social practices, music, languages and indigenous knowledge systems. In the past, the diversity of our cultural experiences was used to foreground our ‘separateness’ in order to support policies of racial segregation and exclusion. Today, this rich diversity of our history and heritage is a resource that belongs to all of us, irrespective of race or creed. Our celebration must affirm a collective sense of history and heritage characterised by multiple dimensions and experiences across the ethnic and racial divide. The diversity of our heritage resources is an expression of collective history that touched all of us differently in the evolution and formation of the democratic South African society as we understand it today.

As the people of Mpumalanga, our approach to history and heritage must promote an integrated approach and a sense of inclusiveness in the articulation of that which we consider as Mpumalanga’s history and heritage. It is important that all the sectors of our society across the racial spectrum engage and participate in the discussions and debates on issues of history and heritage so that we enhance a shared sense of understanding about the content of what defines the provincial heritage. This is an approach that celebrates ‘unity in diversity’ and lays the basis for improved social dialogue, nation-building and social cohesion.

Central to the task of transformation and nation-building is need the for a balanced representation of history and the heritage landscape of our province so that we address the problem of the skewed representation of history and heritage in mainstream historical discourse and cultural symbols. The National Heritage Resources Act No. 25 of 1999 aptly captures the role that heritage plays in our lives:

“Our heritage celebrates our achievements and contributes to redressing past inequities and it deepens our understanding of society and encourages us to empathize with experiences of others. It facilitates healing and material and symbolic restitution and it promotes new and previously neglected research into our rich oral traditions and culture”.

One of the main aspects of our provincial history and heritage is the struggle for liberation in which many of our ordinary people, including your relatives and friends, participated to bring about democracy and freedom that we are enjoying today. Typically, the history of our struggle heroes and heroines is not represented in popular history, which is documented from the ideological vantage point of the politically dominant group at the time. In addressing inequities in the representation of history, it is critical that these aspects of our history are brought on board in the articulation of provincial history.

It gives me great pleasure that earlier today; we witnessed the unveiling of the Ehlanzeni District Cenotaph to honour our heroes and heroines who sacrificed their lives in the struggle to bring about democracy, freedom and justice. The cenotaph is the monumental inscription that acknowledges and honours the commitment and contribution by our struggle heroes and heroes to democracy. As we celebrate Heritage Day today, we must be encouraged that the cenotaph will remain an inspiring cultural symbol for many generations to come. Their lives will continue to be celebrated by future generations to come.

Part of transforming the heritage landscape to reflect a balanced view of popular consciousness, history and experiences is the need to standardise geographical names, names of buildings and streets so that our physical heritage shows inclusivity and balance across the sectors of our society. In this way, symbolic restitution is achieved to promote unity, social cohesion and a shared sense of nationhood. Work on the standardization of geographical names is done in consultation with communities. It is important that this work is undertaken with all the necessary diligence and sensitivity to make sure that community inputs are taken into account. It is a process that must not result in the polarisation of communities because of failures to consult and follow due process.

Ladies and gentleman, as society we must be alive to the fact that one of the subtle forms of subjugation and decimation of any people’s culture and heritage is through people’s alienation from their own languages, which are carriers of culture, identity and national consciousness. In his book, Decolonising the Mind(1986), Ngugi Wa Thiongo, a Kenyan writer, captures the role of language in culture and argues generally that language and culture are inseparable as the loss of language results in the loss of culture. He writes:

“[A] specific culture is not transmitted through language in its universality, but in its particularity as the language of a specific community with a specific history. Written literature and orature are the main means by which a particular language transmits the images of the world contained in the culture it carries.
Language as communication and as culture are then products of each other. . . . Language carries culture, and culture carries, particularly through orature and literature, the entire body of values by which we perceive ourselves and our place in the world. . . . Language is thus inseparable from ourselves as a community of human beings with a specific form and character, a specific history, a specific relationship to the world”. (p15-16)

On Heritage Day, we must celebrate the richness of our indigenous languages so that we promote their development and use at home, in schools, in churches and in areas where we receive services. One of the major programmes that the Department of Culture, Sport and Recreation is implementing is the promotion of indigenous languages. In schools, it is important that we ensure that our children are taught African languages in order to enhance literary and artistic output in these languages. The development and promotion of indigenous languages will contribute to the growth in poetry, music, drama and other performing arts expressed in these languages. The diversity of languages that we have in the Province is our heritage that must be passed on to the next generation. If we do not promote indigenous languages, we will end up with a critical mass of adults who cannot read and write their languages.

As I speak, many of our young children, especially children of the educated elite, cannot write and converse fluently in their own languages. This is a serious indictment to many of us for the kind of the heritage legacy that we will leave behind for future generations. It will be a legacy of adults illiterate in their own languages. I believe something drastic must be done to correct the situation.

As a Province, we have contributed to the discussions about the history and Heritage of the Province through facilitating the research and the publication of the book entitled Mpumalanga History and Heritage. This book is fascinating research that captures the dimensions of provincial history that are not inscribed in the dominant constructs of provincial history and heritage. In this way, it is a research project that enables the Province to address the shortcomings in the skewed representation of Mpumalanga’s history in popular history and heritage by ensuring that it chronicles various aspects of the region’s history, including recording the history of the region’s early inhabitants.

For us, this book does not represent an exhaustive account of the Province’s history and heritage. It is a beginning step that will lead to broad engagement with the heritage findings by communities so that there is a continued exploration and conversation among all of us, as to ‘who we are’, and how our past informs the shaping of our future.

To further contribute to the promotion of provincial heritage, the Province has prioritised heritage as part of the Heritage, Greening Mpumalanga and Tourism flagship project. This is a project that combines the elements of reconstructing, recording and preserving in an inclusive way, Mpumalanga's history and heritage, enhancing biodiversity conservation, sustainable development and effective environmental management practices to create a ‘green' Province'.

In celebrating the Heritage Day, we must revel in the knowledge that our natural and cultural heritage presents immense opportunities to derive economic benefits that are aimed at addressing poverty and unemployment affecting the majority of our people. With the focus on biodiversity conservation, effective environmental management and heritage, the Province intends to exploit opportunities in ecotourism and cultural tourism in order to expand tourism growth. Growth in tourism will expand opportunities for Black participation in the tourism sector, and create prospects for job creation to address poverty and unemployment.

Furthermore, in building the cultural industries sector in the Province, we want to ensure that part of our heritage in the form of cultural artefacts that are made by our artists and crafters is supported to create market access and opportunities for earning income from the creativity of our ordinary people. Currently, the Department of Culture, Sport and Recreation is implementing a training and capacity building programme for our artists and crafters so that they obtain accredited qualifications for the work that they do.

As we celebrate the Heritage Day, we need to reflect on a set of values that we live by to see to what extent the norms and values that we practice as society contribute to building healthy societies and promoting development. The breakdown in the moral fibre in our communities is an expression of a deeper malaise characterised by a lack of a coherent value system that moulds behaviour at community and individual levels. We need to work together in the implementation of moral regeneration programmes so that we inculcate the values of Ubuntu in our approached to social interaction and dialogue.

Heritage Day must present an opportunity for all of us to appreciate, promote understanding and learn from the diverse and rich aspects of our history and heritage so that we promote unity and social cohesion.

Thank You