This holiday, like so many others in our calendar, marks an important moment in the history of our country’s liberation.

It marks the 30th anniversary of the 1976 Soweto uprising.

On that day, 30 000 students took to the streets to protest against the Apartheid education system.

Today, twelve years into democracy, we celebrate the fact that those young protestors did not make their statement in vain.

Yet, I believe there is a new struggle that faces us as we move into our second decade of democracy.

That is the struggle to shift the focus from ‘liberation before education’ to ‘liberation through education’.

Because it is only through education that the opportunities offered by a free society can be grasped.

That is what those 30 000 students were demanding when they took to the streets in 1976.

Their struggle, and, indeed, the entire liberation struggle, was a struggle to ensure that all South Africans would have equal access to opportunities.

And by opportunities, I mean the opportunity for each one of us to realise our unique potential.

The way to make that happen is through equipping our youth with knowledge and skills.

So while we celebrate and remember those who showed great courage in the face of the Apartheid regime’s power, we must also look forward. We must keep a careful eye on how can further their cause in the future.

We need to make sure that in another 30 years’ time, our children will look back on what we have done today and feel glad.

Today our City hosted a range of debates on how we can help to empower the youth of Cape Town.

We hold this event in the belief that one of our critical tasks as a local government is to do everything we can to create more opportunities for our young people.

While we invest in our infrastructure, in our city’s services, and in our environmental resources, we must also invest in the next generation.

As a municipality we do not determine how schools are managed.

But we do have the power to offer facilities and services to young people who wish to expand their opportunities through skills and knowledge.

In this regard I would like to commend the Deputy Mayor, Alderman Andrew Arnolds, for the important work he is doing to rescue our city’s libraries.

Only last week he ensured that the Landsdowne Library was re-opened, after its doors were closed due to a lack of funding.

And he is working with the Provincial Department of Arts and Culture to rejuvenate libraries across the City.

We must recognise that if our children cannot have easy access to a variety of books from an early age, they will be severely disadvantaged.

This is especially the case for those families who cannot afford to buy books for their children.

Of course there are also other ways in which we as a City can create opportunities for our young people.

In particular, we can offer young people some basic skills to help them get a foothold into the job market.

Making the transition from school or a tertiary institution to the workplace is one of the most difficult moves that any young person ever has to make.

In a market where jobs are in short supply and so many of our youth are unemployed, we can find ways to make this journey easier.

We can help by exposing young people to the way in which business engages with the public sector.

We can help by supporting specific skills training.

We can even help young people learn how to start their own businesses.

The City already has a number of youth empowerment programmes of this kind.

Our Department of Social Development has set up projects for entrepreneurs, for drivers’ education and for computer training in high schools.

Today’s discussion has also generated some valuable ideas about how our city can develop and build on these programmes.

It is now up to us to take the necessary steps.