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REMARKS BY THE MINISTER OF HOUSING, SANKIE MTHEMBI-MAHANYELE, AT THE PARLIAMENTARY MEDIA BRIEFING, Cape Town, 14 August 2002

Ladies and Gentlemen of the media,

It is fortunate that we meet just days ahead of the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg.

Sustainable development, as you and your colleagues have been reporting, is connected to many things around us such as the quality of the water we drink and the air we breathe, to the way we approach tourism, the way we manage waste, and to our approach to our natural heritage.

But sustainable development is about much more. Perhaps most importantly, it is about the environment that we as people, as humans, create for ourselves. Housing is central to that environment, for many reasons.

Housing determines how we organise our cities, how we make use of land, how we go about providing access to clean water, health care, electricity, education, how we deal with waste. Because housing is at the core of how we build our human settlements and how we go about organising our urban renewal programmes.

So housing will play a major role at the Johannesburg Summit. My department will be present with exhibitions and we will be interacting at a very high level with governments, NGOs, and international organisations. We have a very full programme.

We engage with our colleagues and with other stakeholders from around the world against the backdrop of what we have achieved in housing the nation in South Africa. And we engage conscious of the challenges still ahead of all of us.

Our achievements cannot be overlooked. They are not just about numbers - although I am sure you would agree with me that 1,4m housing units since this government came to power is an impressive number. These achievements are also to be seen in the fact that housing is firmly located at the top of the national agenda in a way it never was before.

All of us - government at national, provincial and local level, the private sector, and individuals - are conscious of the role housing can play in creating and sustaining viable communities.

Take our programme of handing township houses to their long-standing occupants.

So far, at least 2 million people have benefited from the transfer of ownership of 398 000 houses to their residents.

This is a contribution to sustaining and developing the communities because with ownership comes the willingness to invest and expand one's property. With ownership comes a sense of pride not only in one's own house, but in the street and the area. This is something the former government's approach to the townships was not able to engender. Our communities are benefiting, and I believe anyone who travels around the country as I do can see that.

The sense of ownership which is an essential element of sustainability in development will also be created by a new approach we are taking to subsidies. We have determined that there must be an input of one kind or another from every subsidy recipient. Our goal, once again, is to create sustainable housing developments either by encouraging a culture of saving for housing, or of sweat equity contributions.

Either way - whether recipients choose to link their subsidies to their demonstrated willingness to save, or to their willingness to contribute their own labour - we will be ensuring that there is a pride and sense of ownership which is an essential element of sustainability.

This sustainability, as I have just indicated, depends on contributions from all sectors of society - government, individuals, communities, NGOs, and the private sector.

We are happy that all sectors have, in one way or another, demonstrated their willingness to contribute. But we still have a long way to go if we are truly to reach a housing dispensation in which all of those who are able to contribute to long-term sustainability are indeed doing so to their full availability.

This is why we continue to engage the banks in a dialogue around their contribution to housing stability and sustainability.

I may point out to you that this is nothing new. Among the first things that my department did after the elections in 1994 was to engage the banks on a range of issues from bad debts to red lining and subsidy-linked bonds.

In the eight years since then, we have made every endeavour to respond to the issues raised by the major banks. Together with them, we created Servcon to address the issue of 33 000 houses where the bonds were in default. So far, this public-private partnership, which works quietly and effectively, has helped clear 15 000 bad loans worth R612 million. It continues to do so.

We were responsive to the call for assistance in ensuring that the banks should be able to access capital for subsidy-linked and lower income housing by creating the National Housing Finance Corporation. This finance wholesaler has so far made R1,5bn available to intermediary finance institutions in the housing field.

We have also over the years co-operated with the banks in communicating rights and obligations to newcomers to the housing market. As early as 1995, we spent several million rands in assisting the banks to communicate the opportunities and limits of the subsidy-linked loans scheme.

There are many other examples I could give you, but let me perhaps just say this: The entire history of our interaction with the banks and the private sector as a whole in the sphere of housing is a history of working for co-operation for the good of the country.

We have always sought dialogue over confrontation. We have always worked for constructive solutions to the challenges facing us jointly. But we have also always made it clear that we have a duty to the people of this country to ensure that transformation does not stop at the front door of the banks.

If it is to succeed in creating a more just, stable, and sustainable society, transformation must include the banks and their willingness to adjust their business practices to include those who were traditionally excluded.

I believe the banks are interested in a more just, stable and sustainable society because it is good for business. And so I must believe that they will not only understand where this government is coming from with its calls for transformation. I must believe that they will choose to be willing partners in transformation rather than reluctant participants who have to be carried to the party. It takes two to tango, as I am sure the banks well know.

If they had any doubts, they should ask their colleagues from the smaller financial institutions. Pep, for example, has opened accounts for 351 000 low income earners who previously were regarded as unbankable. This small institution is assisting in creating a culture of savings and financial sustainability.

I mention this example for the simple reason that it shows that it can be done. This is about having the will to transform in the interests of the country.

Ladies and Gentlemen of the media,

Together with the international community, we will be discussing the challenges and opportunities of sustainable development in Johannesburg. I am pleased that housing will be able to make its rightful contribution.

Thank you.

Contact: Mandla Mathebula, 0833041536/ 0724482446

Issued by the Ministry of Housing, 4 August 2002