BY MR MXOLISI ZWANE

Chief Executive Officer

CONTENTCONTENT

• Background

• Introduction

• Legislative Imperatives

• Legislative advantages and Disadvantages

• Governance Structure

• Operational Capability

• Language Services

• Linguistic Human Rights

• Monitoring and Evaluation

• Lessons Learnt

PREAMBLEPREAMBLE

• South Africa with its historical legacy of apartheid recognised only two languages i.e. English and Afrikaans;

• The issue of language has always reflected largely in the struggle for liberation. The 1976 uprising were

largely driven by the revolt of students against the use of Afrikaans in the schooling system;

• These two languages were promoted at the detriment of a number of widely used languages in South Africa.

• It is no wonder then that the language rights were enshrined in the constitution that was adopted in 1996.

• The democratically elected government also moved fast to form PanSALB as one of the constitutional

organisations;

• South Africa has eleven official languages which represent most communities with the exception of Khoi,

San, Nama and Sign Language which it faces extinction.

• With the above mentioned background, sadly the previously marginalised languages continue to experience

under development.

• It is with the above mentioned information that PanSALB’s focus is biased towards promoting, protecting

and preserving the previously marginalised languages.

BACKGROUNDBACKGROUND

• The Pan South African Language Board (PanSALB) was established in 1995 by the

enactment of PanSALB Act of 1995 as amended in 1999.

• As a language constitutional entity its objective is to protect, enforce, promote

and further the development of all official languages in South Africa with specific

emphasis on previously maginalised languages.

• PanSALB is further charged with the responsibility over the development and use of

Khoi, San and Nama as well as South African Sign Language.

• PanSALB seeks to protect the rights of all languages commonly used in South Africa

as enshrined in section 6 of the South African Constitution.

HISTORICAL INFORMATIONHISTORICAL INFORMATION

• Democratically elected Government was put in place for the first time in 1994.

• New Democratic Constitution was adopted in 1996.

• English and Afrikaans were retained as official languages.

• Additional 9 indigenous languages were adopted as official languages.

• Previously marginalised languages are to be developed, respected and

promoted.

• Multilingualism is to be promoted.

• Other languages spoken and used for religious purposes are to be developed.

INTRODUCTIONINTRODUCTION

The Constitution of the Republic of South Africa Act No. 108 of 1996 Section

6 (5) (a) and (b) and No. 29 of 1999 mandates the establishment of the Pan

South African Language Board (PanSALB) as follows:

•Promote and create conditions for, the development and use of ;

– All official languages,

– The Khoi, Nama and San languages, and

– Sign language

•Promote and ensure respect for;

– All official languages,

– Arabic, Hebrew, Gujarati, Hindi, Sanskrit, German , Greek, Portuguese, Tamil, Telegu, Urdu,

and other languages used for religious purposes in South Africa.

LEGISLATIVE IMPERATIVESLEGISLATIVE IMPERATIVES

The protection and preservation of Languages is informed by the following

Legislation;

•Constitution of the Republic of 1996

•Pan South African Language Act of 1995 amended in 1999

•Language Policy Framework for Higher Education of 2001

•Language Policy for Higher Education of 2002

•Use of Official Languages Act of 2012

LEGISLATIVE ADVANTAGES AND LEGISLATIVE ADVANTAGES AND LIMITATIONSLIMITATIONS

Advantages:

Limitations:

•Lack of provisions of the Act that give the decisions of the Tribunal

binding powers

GOVERNANCE STRUCTUREGOVERNANCE STRUCTURE

The PanSALB Act prescribes that a Board be appointed to oversee the

functioning of the organisation. The Board is empowered to appoint sub

committees and structures that will contribute to the fulfillment of the

PanSALB mandate.

The diagram on the next slide depicts this:

GOVERNANCE STRUCTURE GOVERNANCE STRUCTURE (Cont.)(Cont.)

OPERATIONAL CAPABILITY

• At an operational level PanSALB is led by the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) who is supported by the 5

executives based at head office and 3 regional executives responsible for a total of 9 provinces.

• The Head Office is responsible for :

• provision of research services, development of all language content, management of the language

violation processes, monitoring the implementation of all language programmes, evaluation of the

impact of language interventions and provision of corporate support.

• The provincial operations are responsible for :

• promotion and ensuring usage of all language programmes and interventions developed at Head

Office including monitoring and language violation related interventions. Another important aspect of

the role of the Provincial operations is assisting the CEO with stakeholder management and provincial

parliamentary liaison.

LANGUAGE SERVICES

Role and Objectives of the Unit:

Develop language products and services that create a conducive environment

for languages. Development is undertaken through structures that are

coordinated by Programme Managers and Organisational Technical Experts

focusing on specialised technical fields. programme coordination by manager

for PanSALB structures with a provision of technical support, which is a

specialist area within the languages division.

LANGUAGE SERVICES (Cont.1)

These are the Support of PanSALB Structures:

•NLUs The National Language Units are responsible for production of dictionaries and

structured along language lines. They are stationed in the Universities are involved in

production of monolingual, bilingual and trilingual dictionaries.

•NLBs The National Language Bodies are responsible for quality control of language

products. Their function is to authenticate, verify and to standardize language content. The

NLBs ensures quality control on terminology developed by other institutions, organisations or

departments. One of the successes of the NLBs is the production of the Spelling and

orthography rules in the official languages.

•PLCs Provincial Language Committee are the provincial oversight structures tasked to

provide advise on language matters in their respective provinces. Their composition

enhances proportional representation of the language groups in that particular

province.

LINGUISTIC HUMAN RIGHTS

The role of this unit is as follows:

Compliance – Reactive as outlined in section 11 of the PanSALB Act

– Mandatory Role of attending to Linguistic Rights complaints and/or violations

– Attend to violations at its own accord

– Adjudication violations : Linguistic Human Rights Tribunal

– MOA : Enforcement

– Monitor and Evaluate

– Conduct Audits on existence of Language Policy

– Audits on Language Units

LINGUISTIC HUMAN RIGHTS (Cont.1)

Compliance – Proactive:

– Capacity Building :PLC’S

– Advocacy and Linguistic Human Rights Awareness

– What constitute a linguistic Human Right ?

– Capacity Building : Stakeholders drafting of Language Policies

– Capacity Building : Implementation of Language Policies in Schools

MONITORING & EVALUATION

• Monitoring and evaluation unit has been established• It has developed a Policy Framework to:

– Ensure that PanSALB’s Mandate is carried out

– That all structures comply with Legislation

– Senior Manager is in charge of all monitoring processes

– Chairperson Forum is consulted for effective implementation

– Executive of PanSALB is assisting in the implementation

LESSONS LEARNT

Successes:

•Production of monolingual, bilingual and trilingual dictionaries

•Production of Nama booklet

•The launch of the Dr Neville Alexander Language Scholarship•Launching of a Linguistic Human Rights Tribunal

•Back log of complaints addressed;

•There are standard operating procedures on how to lodge a complaint;

•There are standard operating standards governing the complaint administration

process.

•There is a complaint management system that supports the easy accessibility to the

status of the lodged complaints and statistics of resolved or not resolved complaints.

LESSONS LEARNT (Cont.)

Challenges:

•Language matters have been on the back seat and that is reflected by limited budget.

•Revision of the Act

•The production of monolingual, bilingual and trilingual dictionaries.

•The Launch of the Dr Neville Alexander Language Scholarship

•The establishment of reading clubs in various communities such, old age homes,

prisons and in schools

•Lack of provisions of the Act that give the decisions of the Tribunal binding powers

•Lack sufficient budget to conduct advocacy and awareness programs

THANK YOU