Minister of Public Service and Administration for the Republic of South Africa, Mrs. Geraldine Joslyn Fraser-Moleketi. She is representing the government in the current labour dispute.
Originally uploaded by Pan-African News Wire File Photos
Minister Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi has been the target of "unfair personal attacks" for executing collective government decisions, the African National Congress said on Wednesday.
"Government operates as a collective and should therefore collectively account for its policies and programmes," the party said in a statement.
Fraser-Moleketi is the public service and administration minister, representing government in ongoing wage negotiations that have so far led to 13 days of strike action.
"The positions she communicates to the public in general, and to the members of the public sector unions in particular, are part of decisions taken by government as an institution."
Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang and Provincial and Local Government Minister Sydney Mufamadi had undergone similar attacks.
"The amount of abuse heaped upon the minister of health is well documented," the party said.
"It is unfortunate that some people have sought to vent their misgivings with the country's health policies by attacking the minister individually."
Mufamadi had undergone a "verbal assault" around Khutsong for implementing a collective decision on municipal demarcations.
The public should not lower themselves to personal attacks but use available platforms to air grievances.
On Wednesday, Fraser-Moleketi was the subject of some posters carried by striking workers on mass marches countrywide.
The posters included: "Geraldine: Most Wanted. If found 12 percent reward"; "Geraldine. You are the weakest link. KOOBYE" and "Moleketi give your father 6.5 percent".
Tshabalala-Msimang also featured: "ANC govt (oppressor) = HF Verwoerd (Geraldine) + PW Botha (Manto)". - Sapa
Published on the Web by IOL on 2007-06-13 19:23:44
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Minister of Public Service and Administration
Member, Central Committee and Politbureau, (SACP)
Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi was born in Cape Town on 24 August 1960 the first of six children to her teacher father and factory worker mother.
After completing her primary school education in Wynberg, she attended the Livingstone High School at Claremont where she served on the Students Representative Council - before enrolling at the University of the Western Cape to study towards a teacher's Diploma. Geraldine played an active role in the Bellville Association for Community Action, a community action group which raised awareness within the community. She was briefly detained during one of these campaigns.
By 1980, during her second year at university, she left South Africa for Zimbabwe to join the African National Congress in exile, where she worked in political military structures of the ANC under the late Joe Gqabi, Chief Representative of the ANC in Zimbabwe and member of the National Executive Committee (NEC), who was later assassinated. Geraldine was a member of Umkhonto we Sizwe (the military wing of the ANC) and received her basic training in Angola, she also received Officer's Training at the Military Institute of the former USSR and specialised training in Cuba. During her period in exile, Geraldine was seconded by the ANC to the Lutheran World Federation where she worked in the areas of Administration, Communications and Development. She also served in the regional leadership of the South African Communist Party (SACP) in Zimbabwe.
In July 1990, she returned to South Africa at the request of the SACP to set up national legal structures of the SACP and work towards the national relaunch of the party. Between July 1990 and the end of 1992, she served as national administrator for the Party and was personal assistant to successive general secretaries Joe Slovo and Chris Hani. She also worked as office manager and national administrator of the Union of Democratic University Staff Associations.
Geraldine currently serves in the leadership of the SACP. She worked as National Deputy Elections Coordinator in 1993/1994 during the country's first democratic elections of April 1994, after which she became a Member of Parliament. Here she served on the parliamentary portfolio committees on constitutional development and the joint rules committee. Geraldine was elected to the NEC of the ANC at it's 50th conference in December 1998. She serves on the ANC's Social Transformation Committee and the National Elections Committee. She is deployed to the Northern Cape as a member of the NEC.
She was appointed as Deputy Minister of Welfare and Population Development on 9 January 1996 and as Minister of Welfare and Population Development on 1 July 1996.
Geraldine currently serves on the Cabinet Committees for Economic Affairs, Social Administrative Affairs, Security and Intelligence and the Committee on the Service Conditions of Political Office Bearers.
She also serves as chairperson of the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Young People at Risk, which is responsible for co-ordinating the transformation of the Child and Youth Care System as well as the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Poverty and Inequality, co-ordinating the Writing of a report on Poverty and Inequality in South Africa.
Geraldine has been instrumental in mainstreaming gender into government policies. She was the chairperson of the National Preparatory Committee and the deputy leader of the delegation to the Fourth World Conference on Women, held in Beijing China in 1995, after which she coordinated all government departments in a conference of commitments, to facilitate the government's commitment to implement the Beijing Platform of Action.
She also led a study tour to Australia and Uganda which contributed to the setting up of the Office of the Status of Women in the Office of the Executive Deputy President, and the establishment of a Framework for the Commission on Gender Equality.
She was the coordinator, from the side of government, of the National Women's Day celebrations in August 1996, which attracted over 20 000 people from all over Southern Africa.
Geraldine regularly leads South African delegations to the African Union and Commonwealth Women Minister's meetings and has chaired the Youth Minister's Conference of the OAU in Addis Ababa April 1996 as well as the Pan African Conference on Women's Development, Equality and Peace in Rwanda. She also regularly participated in the Copenhagen Seminars, a think tank on Globalisation and Social Development.
Geraldine's leadership role stretches well outside government. She serves on the Border Technicon Council as well as the Nelson Mandela Children's Fund Grant Making Sub-Committee. She is also a member of the United Nations Development Project, Regional Human Development Report Steering committee which coordinates the writing of a Human Development Report for the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Region.
Geraldine plays an active role in the community by being involved in a range of issues that affect her constituency of Soshanguve, North of Pretoria.
She is the sole patron of BT Global Challenge Bursary Fund as well as the National Eisteddfod Academy. She is a patron of the National Working for Water Programme, a trustee of the Nelson Mandela Children's Fund and on ex-trustee and founder member of the Jabulile Ndlovu Educare Trust.
In 1996, Geraldine was awarded a fellowship to the Institute of Politics at the Kennedy school of government, and is currently studying Economics through the London School of Economics.
She enjoys reading and spending quality time with her husband Jabu Moleketi, and children Nothando, Themba and Solomzi.
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