DEPARTMENT OF ARTS AND CULTURE: BRIEFING TO THE PORTFOLIO COMMITTEE ON ARTS AND CULTURE

 

1.THE FOLLOWING DOCUMENTS ARE ENCLOSED:

 

ANNEXURE A: BRIEFING DOCUMENT ON PREPARATIONS FOR THE 29TH AFRICAN WORLD HERITAGE COMMITTEE (WHC).

ANNEXURE B: NATIONAL AUDIT OF HERITAGE INSTITUTIONS AND SECURITY OF COLLECTIONS IN MUSEUMS

ANNEXURE C: PROGRESS REPORT: ESTABLISHMENT OF PROVINCIAL GEOGRAPHICAL NAMES COUNCIL

ANNEXURE D: LEGACY PROJECTS

 

ANNEXURE A

BRIEFING DOCUMENT ON PREPARATIONS FOR THE 29TH AFRICAN WORLD HERITAGE COMMITTEE (WHC).

 

ANNEXURE B

NATIONAL AUDIT OF HERITAGE INSTITUTIONS AND SECURITY OF COLLECTIONS IN MUSEUMS

 

SECURITY OF COLLECTIONS IN MUSEUMS AND THE NATIONAL AUDIT OF CULTURAL PROPERTY

1. INTRODUCTION

1.1. The purpose of this report is to update the Portfolio Committee on Arts and Culture regarding:

(a) The national audit of cultural property; and

(b) The security of collections in Museums.

 

2. NATIONAL AUDIT OF CULTURAL PROPERTY

2.1. Allocated Budget: National Treasury allocated an amount of R7,5 million in the 2004/5 financial year to the Department of Arts and Culture for the national audit. The funds have been disbursed to the South African Heritage Resources Agency (SAHRA). The Department of Arts and Culture will play an oversight role through the task team appointed by the Minister of Arts and Culture, and through regular progress monitoring interaction with SAHRA and the task team.

2.2. Inventory of the National Estate: Section 39(1) of the South African Heritage Resources Act, 1999 (Act No.25 of 1999) specifies that for the purposes of the consolidation and co-ordination of information on heritage resources, SAHRA must compile and maintain an inventory of the national estate, which must be in the form of a data base of information on heritage resources which it considers to be worthy of conservation. This would include:

(a) all places and objects with which it and its predecessors have been involved;

(b) all places and objects protected through the publication of notices in the Gazette or Provincial Gazette, whether in terms of this Act or provincial legislation;

(c) places and objects subject to general protections in terms of this Act or provincial legislation for the management of heritage resources; and

(d) any other place and object which it considers to be of interest. For this purpose SAHRA must co-ordinate, and may prescribe national standards for the recording of information by provincial heritage authorities.

2.3. Management of the National Estate: By highlighting the diversity of our collections, and levels of service provision, this audit will facilitate benchmarking, strategic planning and the future development of the museum sector. The extensive National Audit database will store important information about existing collections and associated services provided by the national museums. It is however intended to be primarily as a management tool, rather than an information resource. This database will enable the South African Heritage Resources Agency (SAHRA) to manage the national estate as is intended in the legislation.

2.4. Publication Obligations: Section 39(7) specifies that SAHRA must publish a summary and analysis of the inventory of the national estate at regular intervals.

3. SECURITY OF COLLECTIONS IN NATIONAL MUSEUMS:

3.2.1 Security Breach at Natal Museum: The Natal Museum has experienced a few cases of security breach over the past few months, but no cultural property or resources have been removed or stolen. To address this problem, the Natal Museum was allocated an amount of R65 000 for the 2004/2005 financial year and an additional amount of R90 000 for the 2005/2006 financial year. Further upgrading of the security will be motivated from the capital works budget.

3.2.2. Security Breach at Nelson Mandela Museum: About 4 years ago, number of items was stolen from the Nelson Mandela Museum. Subsequently, the Museum upgraded its security systems by: (i) installing additional cameras with monitors, and (ii) tagging all items in the collection. Should an item therefore leave the museum, censors at the doors will sound an alarm.

3.2.3. Position of South Africa Internationally: South Africa recently became a signatory to the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict and the 1970 Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit, Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property. The Department of Arts and Culture will establish the National Committee comprising representatives from the National Heritage Council, the South African Heritage Resources Agency, the South African Museums Association, Interpol (SA), the World Customs Organisation (SA) to develop a common strategy to fight illicit trafficking of cultural property.

 

(G/Heritage in Progress_briefingnationalaudit)

 

ANNEXURE C

PROGRESS REPORT: ESTABLISHMENT OF PROVINCIAL GEOGRAPHICAL NAMES COUNCIL

 

PROGRESS MADE AND CHALLENGES FACED ON THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE PROVINCIAL GEOGRAPHICAL NAMES COMMITTEES (PGNC’s)

 

1. INTRODUCTION

1.1. In terms of section 2(1) (a) of the South African Geographical Names Act of 1998 (Act No. 118 of 1998) one of the objectives of the South African Geographical Names Council (SAGNC) is to facilitate the establishment of Provincial Geographical Names Committees (PGNCs).

2. ESTABLISHMENT OF THE PROVINCIAL GEOGRAPHICAL NAMES COMMITEES

2.1.Progress Since February 2004: The Provincial Geographical Names Committees have been established in all the provinces and all the chairpersons of the Provincial Geographical Names Committees sit on the National Council.

3. FUNCTIONING OF THE PROVINCIAL GEOGRAPHICAL NAMES COMMITTEES

3.1. General Challenges: The functioning of PGNCs varies from one province to another. This could be ascribed to, amongst other things, the availability/unavailability of both financial and human resources per province. Most provinces have not developed measurable objectives and targets in terms of their core set of priorities.

3.1.1. Required Interventions: The following key factors are necessary for success of PGNCs

(a) Financial capacity of the PGNC;

(b) Human resource capacity and the skills needed;

(c) Information gathering and processing;

(d) Political buy-in and support at provincial level;

(e) Increasing public awareness on the need to standardize names of geographical features.


3.2. Financial Resource Challenges

(a) Present Cost Drivers: Key cost drivers for most provinces have been traveling and honoraria for members of the PGNCs with very limited spending on awareness, advocacy, promotional material and workshops.

(b) Future Cost Drivers: Identified key cost drivers in the future are staffing, public hearings, consultation, communication and publications.

3.3. Human Resource Challenges

(a) Human Capital and Assets: The key challenge has been the lack of permanent dedicated staff (Secretariat) to support the work of the PGNCs. This includes the unavailability of basic needs like office space and office equipment.

(b) Research and Development: Research capacity should be provided at provincial level to support sound decision-making by the provincial committees.

3.4 Provincial Reporting Challenges

(a) Lack of Proper Reporting Mechanisms: The representatives of provinces to the South African Geographical Names Council, who are in the main chairpersons of the PGNCs, are appointed by the MEC responsible for Arts, Culture and Heritage matters in the province. However, there seems to be a general lack of reporting by these structures to MECs on decisions taken at both national and provincial levels.

(b) Lack of Integrated Approach: The role of other departments other than Arts and Culture is lacking in most provinces. This has denied the PGNCs the benefit of the skills and knowledge of those departments in important aspects necessary for the success of the naming process. The departments that need to be co-opted at the Provincial level include agriculture, land affairs, and local government and traditional affairs.

 

4. NATIONAL LEGISLATION

4.1. Amendments to the Act: Both the Department of Arts and Culture and the South African Geographical Names Council have agreed that there is an urgent need to effect amendments to the Act (the South African Geographical Names Act of 1998 (Act No. 118 of 1998)) in order to streamline the functioning of the SAGNC and the PGNCs.

4.2. Legislative Mandates: The authority to change names lies at local and national levels of government whereas the provincial sphere of government is only responsible for handling the consultative processes. The areas that need urgent attention in the Act are the following:

(a) Section 6.1: Deals with the executive functions of the Council where the DG is mandated to establish the secretariat for the national Council. However the Act does not provide for the functions and the establishment of the Provincial secretariat.

(b) Section 9.1: Provides for the powers and duties of the Council but does not provide for the powers and the duties of the Provincial Geographical Names Committees.

(c) Section 10(4): According to this clause, the Minister is empowered to refer an objection to a name change to the same Council that had initially made the recommendation. This poses conflicts of interest and it tends to impair the notion of objectivity. The establishment of an appeal tribunal may provide a solution to this challenge.

5 PROVINCIAL LEGISLATION

5.1.Role of Provincial MEC for Arts and Culture: The debate around provincial legislation and or regulations creates tensions in terms of the reporting relationship between the MECs and the Provincial Geographical Names Committees. A question has been asked regarding oversight role of the Provincial MEC. This is not spelt out in the national legislation.

5.2.Lack of Provincial Legislative Funding Mandate: Other provinces have cited the lack of a legislative mandate as the reason for their inability to provide funding for the Provincial Geographical Names Committees. An argument has been made that the Act is a national legislation, therefore the PGNCs are established in terms of such Act and must be resourced by the national Department of Arts and Culture. Some provinces like KZN have started with draft legislation to cater for the establishment and the functions of the PGNCs.

6. STEPS TAKEN TO REDUCE BACKLOG OF MORE THAN 57 000 GEOGRAPHICAL NAMES

6.1. Tentative List: This is a tentative list of geographical names that the South African Geographical Names Council received in year 2000 by the Department of Land Affairs’ Surveys and Mapping. The list comprises names that are wrongly spelt, multiple names and duplicated names, offensive names, corrupted names and others that require verification. Some of the names on the list fall outside the jurisdiction of the SAGNC, (like street names).

6.2. Takeover of the Functions by DAC: When the list of more than 57 000 geographical names was handed over to the Department of Arts and Culture (DAC) in 2000 by the Department of Land Affairs (Chief Directorate: Mapping and Surveys), the South African Geographical Names Council (SAGNC) had just been launched in December 1999. By then the systems and capacity at provincial level were still not in place. Provincial Geographical Names Committees (PGNCs) that are central in bringing the process closer to the people and help to facilitate coordination of this exercise at provincial level did not exist.

6.3. Distribution of the List to Provinces: Upon the establishment of the Provincial Geographical Names Committees, the list was distributed to the provinces. After verification and comparison of the two databases i.e. from the Chief Directorate: Surveys and Mapping under the Department of Land Affairs and the Department of Arts and Culture the list was reduced from more than 57 000 to 56 761. It was then allocated as per province as follows:

Free State Province 1 920

KwaZulu-Natal 7 833

Northern Cape 9 137

North West 2 386

Eastern Cape 16 301

Gauteng 431

Mpumalanga 2 438

Limpopo 5 229

Western Cape 11 086

6.4. Geo-Reference Database: After the names were allocated to the provinces it became clear that provinces were not going to meet the dead line set for March 2005 because most local authorities did not have Geographic Information System (GIS) infrastructure which is a critical tool in verification and comparison of databases. This meant that the process was done manually by limited number of researches employed by provinces, thus prolonging the period than was earlier anticipated. Thus a Geo-Reference Database was developed, which serves as a reference, management and monitoring tool, and which also reduces the time it takes to process application forms for people, local authorities and developers to apply on line.

7. CONCLUSION

1. Most of the names that form part of the "backlog list" are names of "minor" geographic features (monuments, nature reserves, streams etc) as compared to major geographical features (towns, mountains, rivers etc). The public and stakeholders have their own priorities (e.g. names of major towns, names of major rivers by the Department of Water Affairs and Forestry, names of Post Offices etc). In a recent national awareness campaign, classification of geographical names as part of a backlog created confusion, as the public believed that all geographical names are subject to review for the purposes of standardisation. Given the lack of financial and human resources, the funding of the Provincial Committees needs to be resolved, as some Provincial Governments have been reluctant to fund the PGNC structures, citing the fact that the Act does not provide for clear roles and responsibilities.

 

ANNEXURE D

NATIONAL LEGACY PROJECTS

 

PROGRESS ON THE SUBMISSION TO CABINET OF EIGHT NEW NATIONAL LEGACY PROJECTS FOR APPROVAL

 

1. The eight new legacy projects were not submitted to Cabinet for approval in 2004, as more research was required on each of the project concepts and the implementation. Particularly, given the slow pace of implementation due to governmental procedures and regulations, a new methodology, which complies with the PFMA and National Treasury regulations was to be considered. The projects were tabled at MinMec for approval in 2004. The submission of the new projects has been done and will be submitted to cabinet for approval in the current cycle.

(G/WHC_MA_NGN_LP_Portfolio Report_Latest_04_03_2005)