Cape Town – The creative industries are becoming the new gold in South Africa, according to the Minister of Arts and Culture, Paul Mashatile.
In previous years, he said on Wednesday, South Africa was proud of selling gold. But the scene was changing with arts, culture and heritage showing it was more than just “singing and dancing” by becoming the new gold.
“That’s where the jobs are going to come from. Our people are creative and the world wants to see our creativity,” Mashatile said.
He was speaking at the Ray Alexander Simons Memory Centre in Gugulethu, where he handed over a R13 million cheque. The centre is housed in what used to be a hostel for migrant workers before being turned into the headquarters of the Food and Allied Workers’ Union (FAWU). The union is the only labour movement in South Africa which has its headquarters in a township.
“I believe that this is going to become a centre of excellence. In the Department of Arts and Culture, we don’t believe in sponsorships. We are a partner here. We are not here to say ‘here is a cheque for R13 million’ and then we are gone. This is just the beginning,” Minister Mashatile said.
Ray Alexander Simons was a Latvian immigrant who helped to launch the South African Federation of Women, and who became general secretary of the Food and Canning Workers’ Union, which was founded in 1940 and later became FAWU.
She and her late husband, Jack Simons, were stalwarts of the trade union movement.
Their daughter, Tanya Barben, said that Ray Alexander Simons was an internationalist who had loved the people of Gugulethu, South Africa and Africa.
“This is the most wonderful way in which anybody’s life can be honoured. I wish my mother and father were alive to see this. They saw so much: they saw South Africa develop into a democracy. This centre will represent the united and vibrant society of a new South Africa,” she said.
The centre will offer jazz development programmes and create an awareness of tourism among workers. Young workers will be encouraged to continue with their education.
The vision also includes plans for a hotel that will encourage tourists to stay overnight in Gugulethu, as well as an ambition to turn flats used by migrants into permanent homes for the present occupants.
The development will be done in two phases. Phase 1 would be to get tourists to Gugulethu, upgrade the parking facilities and the theatre. Phase 2 will include building a Memory Centre, which will make people aware of the role played by the residents of Gugulethu in South Africa’s road to democracy. – SAnews.gov.za
