22 Apr 2015

Xhauxhwatubi Development Trust manager, Mr Iponeng Mosiapitso has expressed a concern regarding the delay by the Ministry of Lands and Housing to approve their management plan.

Mr Mosiapitso said the delay had negatively affected the operations of the trust as workers had been retrenched and only two left.  The management plan is meant to ensure sustainability in utilisation of resources and mostly to identify and suggest possible interventions that are likely to be caused by impact on such resources.

In an interview, he said they submitted the management plan December last year after approval by Botswana Tourism Organization (BTO), adding that BTO also assisted the trust to tender for a joint venture while the lease had been released since 2011.

Mr Mosiapitso said without a plan, all activities had stopped and 15 staff members retrenched because the trust could not generate any income to pay them. Xhauxhwatubi Development Trust is in Phuduhudu village, in North West of Makgadikgadi National Park in Ngamiland district. The village exists in a Wildlife Management Area (WMA) which makes it unique.

The trust manager said the trust had been financially crippled after it was ripped off millions of Pula by a South African Safari operator who partnered with them. Mr Mosiapitso said from the first year of their partnership, the safari operator, who is currently at large has never honoured his contract, resulting in the trust laying off eight escort guides, and a radio operator.

He said the partners owed them over a P1 million and efforts to engage legal steps produced no fruits. “We wrote to the Office of the President seeking intervention and we were told that our partner had been arrested due to illegal poaching in his country,” he added.

He said as a result, the trust had to cover pending costs with the little they had hence financially crippled. Mr Mosiapitso also noted that the trust was not submitting returns at BURS and it faced penalties.

Just like other trusts in Ngamiland, he said, the relocation from consumptive tourism to non-consumptive tourism affected Xhauxhwatubi Development Trust and community development projects which were in the pipeline, as they were suspended due to financial constraints.

Mr Mosiapitso said if the management plan could be approved, the trust would resurrect from the dead and implement more projects since it has secured a potential investor. He said they could do build infrastructure such as lodges and create more employment for the communities.

Besides the challenges the trust encountered, the manager indicated that since its inception, they achieved a lot. The trust managed to house four elderly people in the village, maintained and electrified its office, organised school tours and assisted the communities during funerals, he added.

Mr Mosiapitso said each family was given P1 500 and a trust vehicle was released to assist in the burial preparations adding that ten tertiary students were also sponsored.
He said they have a line of activities in the pipeline and wished their plan could be approved soon so that the trust could achieve its goal of developing the community. Ends