26 Feb 2015

The Assistant Minister for Presidential Affairs and Public Administration , Mr Philip Makgalemele, says the slow pace at which public servants drive the poverty eradication initiative disappoints him. 

In an interview after a tour of some of the poverty eradication projects in some villages in the Ngami constituency, Mr Makgalemele said, although the programme had reached every corner of the country, challenges such as slow implementation were a serious concern.

Beneficiaries often complained about the delay to receive the necessary materials, he pointed out, citing an incident in which a group of three women’s sewing project stayed for a year without operating just because there was no external cord for their generator.

 Mr Makgalemele also revealed that people had indicated that they had been long assessed yet they had never received their packages, and that there was lack of supervision and monitoring by public servants to ensure that beneficiaries were capable enough to sustain their projects.

He urged the district commissioner and the council secretary to be at the helm of driving the program to ensure it produced the expected results. 

Although he acknowledged that implementation challenges existed in the programme, such as lack of operational space, indecision by beneficiaries on project selection, limited suppliers, and limited training facilities in the district, he called for urgency and fast tracking of the programme.

The assistant minister said programme beneficiaries, community leaders and project implementers needed to play their part and ensure that government achieved its mandate of doing away with absolute poverty by the 2016/17 financial year.

Furthermore, he said government had come up with about 45 poverty eradication programmes, although each community was free to come up with any kind of programme they deemed sustainable in addition to those already drafted by government.

He also encouraged communities to form cooperatives, adding that multi cooperatives could employ a large number of community members; and hence assist in eradicating poverty and creating jobs.  

In his earlier meetings with Dikgosi and Village Development Committees at Somelo, Tsau and Sehithwa, Mr Makgalemele said he was shocked to learn that village leaders were not consulted on the poverty eradication programme. 

Kgosi Ebineng Potsoeng of Tsau village informed the assistant minister that there was no proper consultation; hence the projects were not progressing well. 

“As village leaders we should be involved so that we could monitor, supervise and assist beneficiaries if they encounter challenges, but we are sidelined,” he said. 

Kgosi Potsoeng also indicated that there was no adequate public awareness; hence the communities were not forthcoming to benefit from the programme.  

He believed that the programme needed support from other stakeholders in order to be successful and called on public servants to change the way they did things and involve relevant stakeholders. 

However, the assistant minister urged public servants to up their efforts in helping government develop the lives of Batswana. He said war against poverty would only be won through the spirit of teamwork. 

Mr Makgalemele urged them to address kgotla meetings and sell the programme to the communities and also improve the programme by close monitoring and to speed up the assessment process. ENDS