On Sunday  the KZN Integrated Greening Programme, a unique partnership between the Wildlands Conservation Trust, Business SA and the KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Government was launched. Through this partnership, 1 000 000 trees will be planted, 75 000 tons of recycling collected, 1 000 hectares of forest restored and 25 000 hectares of communal land conserved - in 5 years. Ambitious but doable. The work will be done by thousands of community members, striving to improve their lives whilst restoring their living environments. The Programme is the brainchild of the KZN Premier, Dr Zweli Mkhize. In November last year he met with the Wildlands Conservation Trust to try and understand its  Green-preneur model, that has seen thousands of Tree-preneurs and Waste-preneurs established over the past 5 years. He adopted the concept and formally mandated his leadership team to roll out the concept across the Province.
Whilst he was obviously interested in the community greening and cleaning benefits, he was also interested in the "improve yourself" philosophy of these activities. His rally call for the Province is "Sukuma Sakhe" or "Stand up and Build", and he is on a mission to get the communities of the Province to start improving themselves with support through partnerships between Government, Civil Society and Business. Sceptics will argue that this is simply the same refrain to a different tune - which it may well be.

Dr Zweli Mkhize presented two impromptu speeches. The first of these was to a well informed gathering of journalists, bureaucrats and environmentalists. During this presentation he spoke eloquently to the challenges of Climate Change, and the opportunities of the Green Economy and COP 17. He stressed the need for KZN and South Africa to take action NOW, and presented the Programme as one of a suite of examples of the actions which the KZN Provincial Government is taking. His second speech was to a gathering of 1 300 Green-preneurs, currently collecting waste or growing trees. He presented this speech in Zulu and spoke in simple terms, translating the concepts of climate change, pollution and recycling, in a way that had the Green-preneurs entranced.

Andrew Venter CEo of the Wildlands Trust truly believes that he joined the dots for many of those Green-preneurs.

Venter  said, "Watching the Premier in action, I got goose bumps as I worked through the implications of what I was seeing. Not only was the Premier demonstrating a real depth of understanding, but he was also showing real concern and the ability to share this concern and understanding.

I believe that my fellow South Africans are desperately looking for another Statesman to lead us, with humility, integrity and passion, i.e. another Madiba. Madiba's key challenges were the need to achieve political transition whilst redirecting the South African economy so that it could address the South Africa's incredible social inequities. His successors have continued in his footsteps, albeit with limited success when it comes to addressing poverty. The looming impact of global scale Climate Change will have marked impacts on all of us. Our children will look us in the eye and ask us how we could have done the damage we have done. They will probably also judge us for not responding aggressively enough. What I saw on Sunday was the possibility that our Premier could be that next Statesman. He is clearly worried about the environmental challenges facing us and seems to understand them. He is also building a really passionate following across KZN, drawn from a diversity of different political, racial and religious sectors.
I'd like to challenge the Premier to become our first GREEN PREMIER. To harness the environmental change platform to transform KZN and South Africa, buffering it against the impacts of climate change and harnessing the opportunities of the green economy. If he can do this whilst retaining the humility, integrity and passion that he is known for, then we may have our next true Statesman. It is early days and the complexity of the challenges he faces are extremely intimidating. However, this is what great Statesmen do. They become leaders amongst leaders, at times of great change and turmoil."