Address of the President of South Africa, Thabo Mbeki, on the Occasion of the Heritage Day Celebrations, Taung, North West Province, 24 September 2005

Minister of Arts and Culture, Pallo Jordan,
Honourable Ministers,
Honourable Premier of the North West Province, Edna Molewa,
Your Worship, Executive Mayor of Bophirima District Municipality, Kaone Lobelo,
Your Worship, Executive Mayor of the Greater Taung Local Municipality, Nicholas Khonkhobe,
Kgosi Tshepo Mankuroane,
Traditional Leaders,
Your Excellencies, Members of the Diplomatic Corps,
Distinguished guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Fellow South Africans:
Dumelang!

On behalf of the government and people of South Africa, I convey to you our warmest greetings on Heritage Day.
This is the day on which we celebrate the rich and diverse cultural traditions and heritage that have been passed down to us by our forebears.

As on previous occasions, we celebrate our cultural and our living heritage, as expressed in our traditions, oral histories, in performance, rituals, popular memory, skills and techniques and indigenous knowledge systems.

It is indeed fitting that we celebrate this day at the Taung World Heritage Site, which was recently recognized by the 29th Session of the World Heritage Committee in Durban this year.

The recognition and affirmation of Taung and Mokapane's Valley in the Limpopo Province as World Heritage Sites bear further testimony to Africa and South Africa as a cradle of humankind.

It was here in Taung that in 1924 Raymond Dart discovered the fossil bones of our human ancestors. This was to open an important global development of research and discovery about human evolution. Indeed, Taung placed our country on the world map as a place in which humanity emerged.

In recent weeks further discoveries of early hominid tools at Sterkfontein reveal that South Africa has many sites of humankind's oldest and most important heritage, our capacity to make tools.

The primitive implements uncovered at Sterkfontein launched those first human ancestors on a technological journey that has today taken humanity to the most remote corners of the earth as well as outer space. It was those instruments that gave us the possibility to change, re-shape and even re-direct our living environment.

Our sub-theme this year is "Our Indigenous Foods, Our Knowledge and Our Heritage". The significance of the sub-theme is self-evident because food is our primary source of sustenance.

The significance of indigenous knowledge systems that people in every part of the world have developed over centuries to solve and to attend to everyday challenges is underscored by our shared ancestry evidenced here.

Our hominid ancestors' ability to make tools spurred on their hunting and food gathering, opening up the possibilities of permanent settlements and consequently a more secure livelihood. From the East to the West, from the North to the South, human beings have come to regard the production of food as more than a necessary activity to satisfy the most basic human need.

Our government under the auspices and leadership of the Minister of Arts and Culture, Minister Pallo Jordan, envisages a Heritage Policy and Strategy, that seeks to harness our heritage resources to improve the lives of our people.

Indigenous foods and other indigenous knowledge systems can play a pertinent and crucial role in that Heritage Policy and Strategy. All of us as South Africans, irrespective of origin, must and will contribute to this endeavour.

Chairperson,

On the occasion of this Heritage Day it is important that we briefly touch on some of the questions which we have to attend to as South Africans. This is the question of identity and the manner in which our heritage can help in defining what a South African is.

In this regard, we need to answer the question as to what it is that distinguishes a South African from other people, be they Chinese or American. What are the characteristics that inform the manner in which a South African approaches a variety of matters and challenges?

We have to answer these questions because a Heritage Day that is celebrated by all our people should suggest that indeed we do have a past to be proud of; we do have a heritage that helps us face modern challenges and we do have a value-system that guides our behaviour at the individual, family and community levels.

A superficial answer to these questions may suggest that it is not possible to speak of a single South African character and identity which derives from a common value-system because we are a diverse society. Indeed, there is no dispute about the fact that we are a diverse society and all of us have consistently urged that we should use this diversity as a strength that should unite our people.

However, within this diversity there are dominant values and an ethos that bind communities together and ensure social cohesion. These values and ethos drive community members to act in solidarity with the weak and the poor and help members of these communities to behave in particular ways for the common good.

An unpublished study by the organisation called 'Africa Now' dealing with leadership models among different communities asserts, for instance, that there is a strong community spirit among the Afrikaner community in which, particularly through churches and cultural organisations, group identity and solidarity are central to the community.

The same study speaks of the Jewish and Indian communities that have strong family and community structures that ensure coherence and solidarity among the people.

As we know, the African people in this country have, over many centuries evolved a value-system of Ubuntu with its basic tenet aptly captured by the saying: motho ke motho ka batho. Many of us have been brought up to uphold values based on this old-age African adage. Through socialisation many Africans have ensured that our families and communities are themselves grounded on the value-system of Ubuntu.

A close examination of the central tenets of the values that drive the behaviour and approach of the Afrikaner, Indian and Jewish communities reveal that there are many elements that are consistent with the value-system of Ubuntu.

This obviously excludes the misguided racist views that informed the apartheid system which, for a long period of time was used to divide our country and oppress the majority of the population.

Today, government as well as civil society, use elements of this value-system of Ubuntu in their approaches to the day to day challenges. Some of these examples are the government's Batho-Pele campaign that seeks to place the interests of the public at the centre of government work and delivery of services.

Further, government as well as various communities have on different occasions embarked on programmes based on some of the basic elements of Ubuntu such as Letsema and Vuk'zenzele to mobilize people to act together to advance the objective of a better life.

However, we have not done enough to articulate and elaborate on what Ubuntu means as well as promoting this important value-system in a manner that should define the unique identity of South Africans. Indeed, there has not been a campaign to ensure that Ubuntu becomes synonymous with being South African.

Accordingly, I would like to use the opportunity presented by this Heritage Day to suggest that we should perhaps constitute a Task Team that would look closely as this matter of Ubuntu, elaborate on its value system and suggest the manner in which we can use it to define ourselves as South Africans.

Clearly, we have a responsibility to utilise the many positive attributes of Ubuntu to build a non-racial, non-sexist and united South Africa. We also have to use to better effect the values and ethos of Ubuntu in our Moral Regeneration Campaign. This we should do because I am confident that all South Africans, black and white, will agree that this value system should characterise a South African.
Chairperson,

In a society, which for centuries, has been divided and separated and which has denied our people the opportunity to share and experience freely one another's culture, we need to use an important national day such as the Heritage Day to meet and learn from one another the values that our ancestors bequeathed to us so that together we can preserve and conserve that wisdom for prosperity.

As we dance, sing, eat and drink from the same source, we are forging a new South African identity which knows no discrimination on the grounds of race, colour, ethnicity, gender or creed. Together we need to break down racial, tribal and gender boundaries and instead invoke the common traditions that bind us as a nation, as South Africans and as human beings. We once again affirm our common humanity at one of the sites where our species first emerged.

I would like to wish all South Africans a happy Heritage Day.

Thank You.

Kealeboga! Pula!

Issued by The Presidency on 24 September 2005