17 Jul 2014

The National Vision 2016 Council chairperson, Mr Martin Makgatlhe says the council believes that education is key to transformation of any society.

Mr Makgatlhe said this at the official opening of a three-day Vision 2016 regional conference in Ghanzi on July 15. The conference was a collaboration of three districts of Ngamiland, Kgalagadi and Ghanzi.

He noted that transformation was a process that needed to be nurtured to bear desired fruits, citing sectors of education and health as those that government had made progress on to improve the livelihoods of Batswana.

Mr Makgatlhe said government had committed to educate all children in all parts of the country. He further said government had continually provided free education to children and all young people in this country; with net enrollment rate reaching 93.1 per cent in 2013.

He said with that, they had been able to train more students than ever with advent of local tertiary institutions.

With regard to health, he said now 95 per cent of the population was living near health services. He added that Batswana continue to receive health care at reasonable cost, and that ‘Batswana cannot be denied access treatment if they did not have the P5 contribution towards medical expenses.’

However, he said there wass still a lot that needed to be done to improve the lives of citizens especially with regard to poverty, crime, HIV/AIDS and unemployment.

He said it is therefore important for important partners to find ways to address problems identified in the performance report of the Vision Council. 

He said Vision 2016 is a blue print that seeks to propel the country’s social, economic and political development into a prosperous and competitive nation.

Regarding the theme of the conference, Mr Makgatlhe said it is appropriate as the nation move towards the year 2016. He said partners should channel their energies and efforts towards economic and social transformation for the people.

“The existence of every government in any society is premised on the transformation of societies. 

So it goes without saying that for all programmes and projects we undertake, they must transform our communities into a better people,” he stated.

He therefore urged communities to focus on finding ways of contributing to national development and programs that are sustainable and would be able to carry the nation through when the contributions from the mineral sector start to fade away.

He also said there is need to assess continually the impact of programmes in communities; adding that this will require stakeholders as well as community leaders to provide guidance on how such developments should unfold. ENDS