15 Feb 2013

The MP for Kgatleng West, Mr Gilbert Mangole has commended the Minister of Finance and Development Planning for merging parastatals to reduce running costs.

Debating the 2013/14 budget on Wednesday, Mr Mangole also commended the budget for being transparent on the exchange rates movement but wanted to know what motivated this practice.

However, he urged the minister to demonstrate if the Pula had achieved any levels of competitiveness and to say what the indicators were.

MP Mangole said that public sector reforms were a good thing but cautioned that they needed to be geared towards achieving positive outcomes. “Currently, permanent secretaries and other senior government officials are retiring and re-hired on contract. This is counter productive because it sends the message that there was no pool of employees who could replace them,” he argued.

He also agreed with huge investments in education but wondered if there was any return on investment.

Mr Mangole decried the fact that while special education students at Linchwe Junior Secondary School did not have enough resources, the minister continued to pour more funds towards defence.

On other issues, he disagreed with the minister on the issue of productivity noting that the welfare of employees had been neglected; hence it was going to be difficult to motivate them to work hard.

Consequently, he decried the situation where the public service bargaining council was undermined by decisions that were taken outside its structures.

Meanwhile, the MP for Tswapong North, Mr Prince Maele encouraged the minister to integrate the informal sector into the budget. This, he noted, was an important sector that could assist government to fight unemployment by absorbing most of the people without formal jobs.

 He also urged government to expedite issues of civil servants welfare, especially accommodation which hindered them from being productive.

 The MP also complained about persistent water shortages in his constituency and the long distances that people travelled to get anti-retroviral drugs.

 “There is also a need to construct storm water drainage in Tswapong South. Also, many people in my constituency have been trained on poverty eradication programmes despite the fact that funds had not been secured,” he said.

The MP for Molepolole North, who is also the Assistant Minister of Health, Mr Gaotlhaetse Matlhabaphiri applauded the finance minister for presenting a balanced budget.

He however criticised opposition parties for denying Batswana the opportunity to access government programmes meant for them.

Mr Matlhabaphiri told Parliament that the BDP government was aware of the challenges facing Batswana and would address them as and when funds become available.

He said Batswana should be proud as they have a caring government which prioritised their welfare over other things as demonstrated by the 2013/14 budget speech. ENDS