9 March 2006 SPEECH BY COUNCILLOR AMOS MASONDO AT THE LAUNCH OF SUNDAY TIMES HERITAGE PROJECT, NEW TOWN - JOHANNESBURG Programme Director The City Manager: Pascal Moloi The Sunday Times Editor: Mondli Makhanya The Business Community Artists Creative Industry Partners Heritage Practitioners Volunteers from various communities Distinguished Guests The media Ladies and Gentlemen Programme Director, it gives me great pleasure to be here this evening. Not as an elected public representative or the Executive Mayor. But as a brand new councillor yet to be formally inducted. For the past four months we have worked in partnership with the Sunday Times to ensure that all the necessary consultation and planning was undertaken to install a number of new art works and commemorative plaques on the occasion of its (Sunday Times) 100th birthday. One may, however, ask: "Why is this important to the City of Johannesburg and all of its residents?" During the year 2005, the Council approved the Human Development Strategy. This was a significant milestone. Along with the Joburg 2030 Strategy, this Human Development Strategy stands as a key pillar towards the generation of the City's economic growth and development. The Human Development Strategy addresses itself to a number of fundamental aspects of community life: It talks about skills development, building a sense of community, seeking to ensure empowerment amongst residents for each individual to realise his or her full potential and building safe communities in which neighbourhood squares are populated with public art and public performances. Over the past few years there have been a number of initiatives in which the City, artists, managers and the business community have collaborated with City planners, historians and the manufacturing sector, to install public art in different parts of the City. The Joburg Art City Project, the Main Street Mall, the Sandton CBD Art Project, Buskers in Rosebank are some of the examples of how public art and public performance have been used to transform public space and make it attractive, safe and clean as well as tell stories about our distinctive history or create objects and images of beauty that helps to address and define our own Joburg specific identity. Programme Director, all of these activities contribute to the creation and prioritising of Joburg as the art and cultural hub of Africa. What is excellent about this Sunday Times project is that it is targeting and intends to spread to many other cities in South Africa. It seeks to carry the values of human development, public art and Memorialisation far and wide. The role of the City has been to help facilitate, a number of partnerships, to develop policy, to ensure that there is a proper maintenance plan and to work together with business and the community in matters of safety. In October 2006, this City will be celebrating its 120th Birthday. We may, amongst other things, have to clean and spruce up the Milner statue, investigate the actual condition of the Von Brandis Statue and make known to the public, the early history of Johannesburg through exhibitions and similar events. This will add momentum to our on going inner city urban renewal and regeneration efforts. I would like to thank the Sunday Times for hosting their birthday in Johannesburg and for installing ten public monuments that begin to deepen and broaden the artistic palette of the City and to tell stories of all the people who have inspired and grown this City. This evening, Programme Director, we unveil the first installation bronze statue of Brenda Fassie. This is the woman who managed to combine groundbreaking musical success with accessibility and humanness that continues to draw a fierce loyalty and protectiveness from her fans. Tonight we salute Mabrrr. Brenda Fassie lives on. She lives in the hearts of the millions of people of this country and her many fans on the continent of Africa and elsewhere. This is the one who brought hope and joy to many through her music. We adore her. Let us celebrate all of this together and may her legacy live on. Thank you