Lael Bethlehem
CEO
Johannesburg Development Agency
Tel: +27 11 688 7850
www.jda.org.za
Lael Bethlehem is CEO of the Johannesburg Development Agency. She joined the agency from the City of Johannesburg, where she was director of economic development from mid-2002 to mid-2005. In that role, Bethlehem was responsible for the implementation of the Jo’burg 2030 strategy. Prior to that, Bethlehem was chief director of forestry at the national department of water affairs and forestry, a post she held for four years. Other posts included working as an economic researcher at the National Economic Development and Labour Council (1996 to 1997), the Congress of South African Trade Unions research centre Naledi (1994 to 1996), and the Industrial Strategy Project (1992 to 1993). After graduating from King David High School, she attended Wits University and studied for BA honours and master’s degrees in industrial sociology. Bethlehem is a board member of the International Institute for Environment and Development, an environmental research organisation based in London.
Tasneem Essop
Minister of Environmental Affairs and Development Planning
Western Cape
Tel: +27 21 483 3915
www.wcpp.gov.za
Tasneem Essop, with her background in the United Democratic Front and the labour movement, has brought a dynamism to sustainable development in the Western Cape, which is one of the world’s biodiversity hot spots but is also notorious for its inequitable social development. Essop was the Western Cape transport, public works and property management minister before she was appointed minister of environmental affairs and development planning in 2004.
She has also served as the African National Congress’s Western Cape spokesperson on finance and public accounts, and as chairperson of the National Association of Public Accounts Committees. Essop has focused on efforts to “embed” sustainable development into the fabric of Western Cape society. She hosted a conference on provincial sustainability in mid-2005 that will become a blueprint for other provinces, and for regional governments internationally. In early 2005, she was appointed co-chair of the Network for Regional Governments on Sustainable Development.
Nondumiso Maphazi
Mayor
Nelson Mandela Metro
Tel: 041 506 3267
www.mandelametro.gov.za
Nondumiso Maphazi has come a long way since her first formal job as a petrol attendant — today she is the first woman executive mayor of the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality. Her political career started as a student movement activist and she has served as a member of the South African Clothing and Textile Workers’ Union in East London (during a stint as a machinist) and the National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union in Port Elizabeth. She has been a South African Communist Party branch and district executive member, and a member of both the African National Congress’s regional executive committee and its regional working committee. After the 1994 election, she served as an MP in Parliament before moving to local government, where she served as chairperson of the Nelson Mandela Bay municipality social services committee and later the infrastructure, engineering, electricity and energy business unit until she was elected executive mayor in March.
Lulama Matyolo-Dube
Secretary
National Council of Provinces
Tel: +27 21 403 2127
www.parliament.gov.za
As secretary to the National Council of Provinces, Lulama Matyolo-Dube manages the staff who support the house in discharging its constitutional functions. An advocate, her line function is providing procedural and legal advice to the presiding officer to ensure compliance with the rules of procedure and the Constitution. After qualifying at Fort Hare with a BA, her first job was translating Bills from English and Afrikaans into Xhosa. In the early 1980s, Matyolo-Dube joined the University of Transkei as a committee clerk. She studied law and climbed the ranks, eventually being appointed as the institution’s first black woman assistant registrar: academic.
In 1994, Matyolo-Dube joined Parliament at the national assembly table. She was the first black woman to be appointed as manager in Parliament and during the challenging transformation she held the position of division manager: legislation and oversight. In 2000, she was appointed to her current position and since July 2006 has also been the acting chief legal adviser to the house.
Nandi Mayethula-Khoza
Member of Mayoral Committee
Community Development
Tel: +27 11 407 7448/6719
Nandi Mayethula-Khoza is a member of the Johannesburg Metro Council’s mayoral committee charged with community development, a position she took up after the March 1 2000 local government election. The former speaker of the City of Johannesburg’s council (since 2000), she has been a political activist since her teens when she participated in the 1976 Soweto uprisings. In 1977, she went into exile in Swaziland, where she obtained a BSc and diploma in education from the University of Swaziland, and only returned to South Africa when both her parents died. In 1994 and 1995, she was deployed by the ANC as a municipal councillor and became mayor of Soweto in 1997. She chairs various committees, including the Multiparty Women’s Caucus, and is responsible for the coordination of 109 ward committees and the capacity building of councillors. In addition to her University of Swaziland qualifications, she also holds a bachelor of education from Wits university and is currently working towards a master’s in public and development management.
Amanda Nair
Executive Director Planning, Transport and Environment
City of Johannesburg
Tel: +27 11 407 7314
www.joburg.org.za
Amanda Nair, as executive director of planning, transport and environment for the City of Johannesburg, is responsible for everything that happens in the city’s urban environment, and vehicle emissions are high on her agenda. Among her projects is the creation of a sustainable public transport system for the city that will not contribute more harmful greenhouse gases to the atmosphere. Her department plays a major role in providing development direction for Johannesburg. Nair believes poverty arises from not using the city’s resources efficiently. Part of her job is to marry development and environmental concerns to ensure sustainability for the people of Johannesburg.
Nkele Ntingane
Speaker
Council of the City of Johannesburg
Tel: 011 407 7484
www.joburg.co.za
Nkele Ntingane was inducted as the speaker of the City of Johannesburg’s council after the March 1 2000 local government election. A founder member of the civics movement, she was a Federation of Transvaal Women and United Democratic Front activist. Ntingane has held various positions in civic organisations, the African National Congress and the Alex Women’s Congress. During various states of emergency, she was detained without trial and was the first women detained at the Johannesburg “Sun City” Prison and was also the last to be released (1985 to 1986). After the unbanning of the ANC and other anti-apartheid organisations in 1990, she became the first ANC deputy chairperson. Ntingane’s service in local government began as chairperson of the metropolitan local council executive committee and included duties as chairperson of the public safety portfolio committee and, more recently, as a member of the mayoral committee on municipal enterprises.
Virginia Petersen
Head of Department of Social Services
Western Cape
Tel: +27 21 483 3083
www.pgwc.gov.za
Virginia Petersen is the head of the Western Cape department of social services and poverty alleviation. She studied social work at the University of the Western Cape and completed a master’s in social science (clinical) at the University of Cape Town. She holds several diplomas in human resource management, public sector management, and public policy and social safety nets. Her experience spans 25 years in both private and public sector welfare and she is currently pursuing a PhD at the University of Cape Town. Petersen joined the provincial government in 1994 when she was appointed the coordinator of the provincial minister for health and social services’s strategic management team. In July 1995, she was appointed head of the provincial department of social services and, in December 1998, she was promoted to deputy director general in the department of health and social services. In December 1999, she took up the position of superintendent general in the same department.
Gwendoline Malegwale Ramokgopa
Executive Mayor
City of Tshwane
Tel: 012 358 4905
www.tshwane.gov.za
Gwendoline Malegwale Ramokgopa was born in Atteridgeville, Tshwane. She qualified as a medical doctor (MBCHB) at Medunsa in 1989 and is currently studying towards her master’s in public health. While still a student, she was variously president of the Medunsa students’ representative council and on the executive committees of various students’ organisations, before moving on to the structures of the African National Congress. Ramokgopa worked as a medical officer at Dr George Mukhari Hospital until 1992 and joined the Independent Development Management Trust as national health programme manager. In 1995, she was a member of the strategic management team of the Gauteng health minister and also a medical adviser at the Gauteng Department of Health. As the leader of the ANC in the council, from 1995 to 1998 she served as deputy chairperson of the executive committee at the city council of Pretoria. In 1998, she was appointed provincial health minister, a position to which she was reappointed in 2004. She is currently serving as the executive mayor of the City of Tshwane.
Helen Zille
Executive Mayor
Cape Town Metro Council
Tel: +27 21 400 1300
www.capetown.gov.za
Cape Town mayor Helen Zille was recently elected Democratic Alliance leader at the party’s national congress. Before taking over the mayoral hot seat from the African National Congress’ Nomaindia Mfeketo, she was the national spokesperson and spokesperson on education for the DA. Zille, who has a BA from the University of Witwatersrand, joined the former Democratic Party in the mid-1990s. She was elected to the provincial parliament in the 1999 general election and appointed provincial minister for education in the coalition government between the New National Party and DP, which became the DA in mid-2000. She served until the DA split away at the end of 2001. She then became leader of the opposition in the provincial legislature until 2004 when she was elected to the national Parliament. Zille’s interest in politics began in the early 1980s when she became involved in the Black Sash and the End Conscription Campaign. She worked as a journalist with the South African Associated Newspapers group.
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