Speech delivered by the Minister of Basic Education, Mrs Angie Motshekga, MP, on the Occasion of Breakfast for the 2021 Top Matric Learners held at Auckland Park, SABC

21 January 2022

Programme Director

Deputy Minister

Director-General

Top Learners & their Parents: Our special guests

Distinguished Guests

With tremendous honour, I speak on this auspicious occasion, the 2021 Top Matric Learners in ordinary public schools. 

You must understand the magnitude of being a top learner in 2021.

The Class of 2021 is literally and figuratively in a class of its own.

It is the only class so far that studied for two consecutive years under the state of disaster measures to mitigate against the spread of Covid-19.

Fellow South Africans,

Let me take this opportunity to welcome all of you to the glitz and glamour of the 2021 Top Matric Learners.

The Top Matric Achiever's Breakfast is an important gathering in the calendar of the Basic Education family as we converge here today to celebrate the exploits of top learners in public schools.

As we know, top matric learners are true ambassadors of public schooling, often under siege from free-market fundamentalists.  

The top learners carry the whole basic education system on their broad shoulders and thus represent the hopes and aspirations of their schools, families and communities every year.

Honouring the top learners is not an act of vanity but affirmation.

As a nation, we affirm that honesty has its rewards.

We exalt the virtues of hard work over the instant success of the Lotto craze.

Honouring the top matric learners is an excellent gesture for a large and complex system such as ours.

We truly celebrate the gallant efforts of a select few amongst us who tower above all the rest.

These top learners’ awards provide us with a rare opportunity to shout over the rooftops about sustained excellence in our basic education system, focusing only on the crème de la crème of the system.

As we know, these awards aren't two-minute noodles but due to 12 years of blood, sweat, and tears.

Only those who make excellence a habit become top learners. 

It is not a child's play to become a top learner in the largest public examinations in the SADC region.

As the Minister of Basic Education, I value high achievers and hold them in high regard.

Top learners certainly do our work as politicians, bar insults and scorn worthwhile. 

As Aristotle once said: “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, therefore, is not an act but a habit”.

Let’s congratulate all top learners for again setting the bar very high.

We know that there's an exhausted teacher, principal, and caregiver behind every top learner.

We salute all of you as true patriots.

For many who were called into the service of your country and only a few answered the call.

Through thick and thin, you persevered till the end.

All of you (top learners, teachers, principals and caregivers) represent what it means to be an achiever in the basic education sector through deeds, not words.

Like I said a few years ago, you have summited Mount Kilimanjaro in your race to summit the metaphorical Mount Everest.

The founding father of the new South Africa, former President Nelson Mandela summed it up thus: “After climbing a great hill, one finds that there are many more hills to climb”.

Don’t be fooled into self-righteousness; your journey to tremendous success has only just begun; the next hill is university/college studies, then the world of work, coupled with life and its heartaches.

Just follow your heart and take that first step towards the next hill because, as the English are wont to say, “A bold attempt is half of success”.

However, we are proud that we have given you a solid foundation to keep climbing more hills to the success you both desire and deserve.

Indeed, a good beginning makes a good ending.

As we know, public schooling teaches beyond academics. Still, it incorporates teaching about life and building a truly democratic, non-racial, non-sexist, united and prosperous society based on justice and equality.

I urge you to be grateful for the process of the last 12 years of basic education because now it’s part of your proud history and part of your life.

In the last 12 years, you have made metaphorical crawling, walking, learning to speak and write.

During these formative years of schooling, you were taught vital skills about the rules of logic, and the meaning of knowledge, amongst others.

After 12 years of learning, you have mastered the art of knowledge acquisition; your next step in life is knowledge production.

Now it's time to take your lessons from the last 12 years and march to the proverbial ‘finish line.’

I hope you also learned the art of being kind, good manners and the value of being grateful for small mercies.

Your gratitude should extend to your teachers, caregivers, parents and community.

As Africans, we rightly believe that: ‘It takes a village to raise a child.’ This proverb leverages the cultural context and belief that raising a child takes an entire community.  

It is proven in our contexts that a child has the best ability to become a healthy and prosperous adult if the entire community takes an active role in contributing to the rearing of that child.

In the basic education sector, we proclaim that: ‘Every child is a national asset.’ This is in line with President Cyril Ramaphosa’s contention that: ‘Education is indeed a societal issue.’

As you begin your journey towards adulthood, history demands you to espouse values of hard work, honesty‚ truth, integrity, humility, and selflessness.

March to victory and conquer your fears.

As the cliché goes, become the better version of yourselves.

You, the Top Learners of the Class of 2021, are indeed the epitome that success comes at a price.

You have shown through action, not an omission, that success is indeed a habit worth emulating.

I am indeed honoured to be amid the crème de la crème of public schooling.

To this end, your extraordinary achievement is due to your caregivers, parents, peers, teachers and community that instilled in you solid moral principles and a robust work ethic.

All you had to do was burn the midnight oil and then experience the euphoric sweet smell of success.

Similarly, you had the self-belief that you could make your dreams become a reality.

You understood from the beginning that you'd never achieve your dreams if they didn't become goals.

These values and early life lessons surely must continue to be building blocks of stellar victories way into the future.

As a parent myself, I am very proud of you.

Posterity will remember you for setting the bar high.

You have sent a profound message to all South African children that one's circumstances must not condemn anyone to perpetual poverty, failure and perennial under-achievement.

Through your stellar performance, you have demonstrated that total discipline is everything.

Discipline is being consciously aware that you cannot be everything all the time.

As you know, time management is ultimately the only determinant between those who realise their goals and those who excel only in giving excuses for failure.

On behalf of the Ministry of Basic Education and all Provincial Education MECs, we congratulate you on your awe-inspiring achievements.

I want to thank you all for your discipline, focus and relentless pursuit of excellence.

You undoubtedly didn't put too many irons in the fire.

From now on, as I said earlier, you are the true ambassadors of public schooling.

Let me emphasise, Covid-19 still lurks in our midst. Stay safe, vaccinate and continue to shine even brighter.

Nothing succeeds like success.

All the best in 2021 and beyond; remember, “If you want something done right, you have to do it yourself”.

In conclusion, I say, “Be not afraid of greatness. Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and others have greatness thrust upon them." as William Shakespeare once famously opined.

I wish you well in your future academic and life endeavours.

I thank you.