Pretoria, 15 November 2001
First of all, let me join the people from South Africa who have welcomed all our guests who have been participating in the important processes in which we have been engaged in this conference.
I trust that the work in which we have been engaged, has assisted our continent to move forward.
What happens in an Imbizo is that you get called by the leadership in your area, village, or whatever, you get called to a discussion of particular issues and in the 'Imbizo', you don't act, you discuss the action that you should collectively take. That is what an 'Imbizo' is.
And I would hope that in the Imbizo we have had, we have discussed what action we need to take with regard to the African continent.
Because having decided in the Imbizo what we must do, then all of us have an obligation, in fact, to carry out the decision that we arrived at at the Imbizo.
On this continent we suffer from a suffix of good decisions.
And we suffer from a problem of good decisions not implemented.
And from this Imbizo, I would hope, that when we leave, we would want to correct the imbalance between our decisions and the actions we take, having decided to take those actions.
Addressing the youth leaders that are here from the African continent, I would like to say that you have come to South Africa during an important year. It is the 25th anniversary of the Soweto Uprising.
That was the year 1976, when the youth of this country at school decided to rise up against oppression, against apartheid.
Many young people died, many young people were maimed.
But those young people played a central role in liberating this country from oppression.
Many of our visitors from outside the country would have met some of them now. They have passed beyond their youthful years and are playing an important role in the reconstruction of South Africa as a democratic society.
It would seem to me that the youth leaders that are here today, from this country and the rest of the continent, are the successor generation to the generation who fought for the liberation of this country, a cause which was not a South African cause, but an African cause.
And that successor generation to the youth of 1976 has another liberation struggle to conduct.
It is a liberation struggle against poverty, against underdevelopment, against disease, against backwardness, against marginalisation of the African continent and of the people of Africa. A liberation struggle to place the continent where it should be as a n equal amongst the continents of the world.
It is also a liberation struggle.
We have to liberate ourselves from these terrible things that all of us know.
But I think it is also an exciting period for our continent.
The current political leadership on the continent has taken two important decisions.
I am talking about the decision to transform the OAU to the AU.
Some unkind people have said it is a reflection on the quality of our leadership that our leadership work so hard in order just to drop one letter 'O', so that instead of having OAU, you have AU.
But clearly it is more serious than that. The decision was taken because it was our collective feeling that the OAU has done an excellent job during a particular period. We are entering a new period that required that we as Africans must move further forwa rd with regard to the matter of the consolidation of the unity of the peoples of our continent, because indeed, I am sure the historians in this room will confirm that since the 19th century this has been the hope and the dream of the peoples of Africa, an d the African people in the diaspora, that Africans would unite.
I am saying that the decision to drop the 'O' and keep the 'A' and the 'U', has to do with the absolute imperative that as Africans we act together to address these challenges of poverty and underdevelopment.
The other important decision that the continent has taken, is of course the New partnership for Africa's Development.
It is an important decision because it reinforces the processes by which the African continent would be able to act together to solve the problems and to respond to the challenges that the continent faces with regard specifically to these matters of povert y and of underdevelopment.
So, I think we have ahead of us a bright future.
But whether we do in fact realise that bright future depends on the young people from the continent who are here with us, at the ITU conference.
But I think we are also fortunate that these particular processes on the continent take place when all of us are seized with this extraordinary possibility that is given to all of us by the development of the Information and Communication Technologies.
Part of what is interesting about this technology is that it clearly is a product of developed societies.
But I am quite convinced that its biggest impact, its biggest beneficial impact, is on underdevelopment.
And therefore I think that our young people, the successors of the generation of 1976, has a particular challenge to understand and to master the technology.
To master it not so that it becomes a matter of boasting, that I know how to access the Internet, I know how to use computers, I know how to use a satellite phone, I know how to access satellite, television or whatever, but in order to master it so that we can then say: how can we use this technology to overcome these enormous challenges of poverty.
There are some people in this country who say they have the misfortune of having a rather foolish and unpopular president.
And one of the reasons why it is said this president is foolish, is because he surfs the Internet.
And it is really asserted with great vigour and certainty: how can the president be surfing the Internet at midnight? He must be a bad president.
It doesn't worry me very much.. It embarrasses me that you have South Africans who communicate with the rest of the world who have such a poor understanding of the technology that you have been discussing during this week, that they think that the Internet is something to be ashamed of. It embarrasses me as the president of this country.
But I would like to know that our youth would ignore such criticism, that we are up to speed with regard to the development of this technology.
And that youth would ask a question of the President of South Africa, what have you done, Mr President, to make sure that this technology is available in the villages of South Africa? Because this technology, as I have been saying, which is developed in the developed world, but is particularly relevant for us who are poor, helps us to move forward to advance faster with regard to education, to medicine, in development of business, all m anner of things. We can move faster because of access to this technology.
We have to answer many questions, as Africans, even if we have this technology and the infrastructure and all that, about what is it that we communicate? What is the content that we communicate with this technology? Are we doing enough work as Africans, to put an African content, whatever that may be. If we want to teach young people mathematics in a village, have we written those programmes ourselves; if we teach somebody history and we want examples, are these our e xamples, or are they somebody else's examples.
We were in Mali two weeks ago. We saw manuscripts there, all of which came from the old universities and were written in the year 1204.
And here we have these manuscripts which are 700, 800 years old, that come from an African university in the desert. What does it mean that in Africa 800 years ago there was a university at that level? It says, that as Africans we have always been an educa ted people.
And this is a message we must communicate to the young people. These youth leaders here must communicate that message to other young people to say that we have always been an educated people and therefore, if we have fallen behind now, all that it means is that we have a responsibility to do what we have always done over the centuries.
We have to master the technology.
We have to use the technology to overcome the problems that our continent faces. We have to make sure that as we use this technology to master those problems, that we also succeed in overcoming this problem that the African people at home in Africa have be en cheated for centuries in being marginalised. We forget that.
I am therefore saying to the African youth that are here, as we said at the beginning, that we see you as the successor generation to the generation of this country of 1976. We fought for liberation against oppression. We must continue the fight for libera tion against poverty, against underdevelopment, against marginalisation.
And the technology, the information and communication technology that you have been discussing is a critically important tool in that struggle. Therefore I would like to say that to our youth that their presence here today is part of the laying of the grou ndwork for the implementation of the New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD).
The work that has been done by the ministers that are here, and the governments they represent, with regard to the ICT sector for Africa, is indeed giving meaning to the dream of equality for Africa and the dream for Africa's renewal.
The poet Tanure Ojaide, in his poem called 'Kwanza', wrote.
"Those who mocked our naked hands for lack of industry
will be ashamed of their ignorance of our palmistry,
those who jeered at our play-punctuated war-songs as idle songs
will join us in the proud anthem of survival....
In our time, the patient sun tunnels
through mountain clouds and vast obsidian night
into the fresh radiance of a cheerful dawn."
Friends, here as we find ourselves at a moment in our history which is wholly new, and potentially beautiful, let us be conscious of the fresh radiance of a cheerful dawn, and work with renewed vigour to fulfil all of our dreams.
In this context I would like to reaffirm our commitment to these dreams by welcoming the launch of the E-Africa Commission.
And this commission, as we all know, will be responsible for developing e-strategies and projects at a continental level, as well as managing the structured development of the ICT sector.
Indeed, I have full confidence in the illustrious Africans who constitute this commission, and I am quite sure that under the very active and wise and sound guidance of President Konare, they will fulfil their functions well.
I would also like to say now that we are very happy that we could launch the e-schools programme. This initiative which seeks to prepare Africa's youth for active and intelligent participation in the new economy, is critically important for the success of our continent.
And I must say, Mr Motsomi, congratulations for starting the youth forum, clearly, as we have indicated, an important event in the history of the ITU. Certainly for us as Africans, it will assist us enormously in terms of addressing our needs.
We have established in this country as entirely a South African thing, an International Advisory Council on the Information Society, which is made up of the global leaders in the information and communication technology sector.
This advisory council on the information society, we have established as a South African initiative, but I wanted to say we discussed this matter with them when we met recently, and they committed themselves, all the major players around the world on this issue of information and communication technology, they committed themselves to work also for the success of the continent in this regard. I am therefore quite happy to announce them as among the founding partners of the Information Society Partnership for Africa's Development (ISPAD).
I must say to everybody who has come to South Africa from outside of this country, thank you very much for coming, and I hope that because of your work, or simply out of friendship and solidarity, you will share with us the fresh radiance of an African daw n and come back again.
To our youth, the African youth, if the African continent doesn't move forward, the fault will not be in our stars, but in ourselves. I am quite certain, that as the youth of Africa, that we shall not fail.
Thank you very much.