10 Jun 2014

Ministry of Transport and Communication is faced with problems that emanate from non-performance by employees, improper budgeting and lack of capacity to carry out duties as well as corruption.


Ministry’s permanent secretary, Ms Tsaone Thebe told the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) that her ministry was devising strategies of moving people around work stations to trace the problems and augment skills personnel.

She said it had been established that some officers had overstayed in stations and therefore had developed their own cartel of people within the communities they served.


Ms Thebe said service delivery in her ministry was greatly affected due to improper budgeting, but noted that the ministry was working around the clock to improve on financial management controls.


With regards to vehicle maintenance, she said despite outsourcing the maintenance of government vehicles with private garages to ease the backlog at the Central Transport Organisation (CTO), there still remained a problem of officers not being able to apply themselves.


She said there had been a myriad of factors, which led to non-performance that also affected utilisation of funds.
 Ms Thebe said CTO made an initiative to order spare parts from manufacturers to get the economies of scale.

This was because those who won tenders did not have enough spare parts and that the process of them ordering large quantities abroad meant late deliveries of supplies and the ministry ended up not spending.


She said the capacity of CTO in terms of relevant competencies was also a factor and government felt that the organisation should spread officers to different departments to monitor maintenance by private garages. 
 Ms Thebe said purchasing of equipment or spare parts had also been decentralised but, there were still some teething problems. 


She said the essence of decentralisation was that each ministry should see to it that it was responsible to manage its fleet and see to it that a unit within the ministry was set to deal with all issues pertaining to transport.


Ms Thebe said it had also emerged that sometimes CTO regional director and department of road transport and safety (DTRS) engaged in petty issues at the expense of service delivery.
 “It is a question of ethics also but we have put systems in place for monitoring,” she said
.

PAC member, also Palapye MP, Mr Moiseraele Goya had asked why there were over 200 vehicles awaiting maintenance in Maun, while there was an unspent P62 million under the recurrent budget and unspent balance of P18.2 million under the Central Transport Organisation (CTO) budget.


Another PAC member and Kanye MP, Mr Kentse Rammidi had asked why the ministry was not decentralising purchasing of spare parts as it seemed every approval of spare parts purchasing was done from the headquarters.


On roads maintenance, Ms Thebe said sometimes even if money was allocated, contractors raised issues and the ministry ended up involved in negotiations and sometimes court cases with long adjudication processes.


She said the procurement process also had its own problem, adding that the ministry had since resolved that before the start of financial year, the process of tendering should start so that as Parliament approved budget, projects might take off.


On a more positive note, Ms Thebe said the Botswana Railways was engaging  the ministry to resuscitate passenger train, but needed some subsidy from government. 
She said the minister had since asked the Botswana Railways to make a proper request of subsidy as the passenger train would also alleviate congestion on roads.


Ms Thebe further said her ministry would conduct an audit as to why there were long queues at BotswanaPost countrywide because the officers were adamant that the queues were not in any how related to manpower shortage.


She also said there were opportunities related to the establishment of the transport hub, such as trade facilitation within the SADC region, and cargo hub which could benefit the locals wishing to engage in businesses along those lines.


PAC member, also Shoshong MP, Mr Phillip Makgalemele had asked what opportunities were brought along the introduction of transport hub. ENDS